USPS Losses Total $3.3B in First Quarter as Mail Volumes Decline
Other details of the first quarter results compared to the same period last year include:
- Total mail volume of 43.7 billion pieces, a 6 percent decrease.
- Operating revenue of $17.7 billion, a 1.1 percent decrease.
- Operating expenses (before prefunding of retiree health benefits and the impact of discount rate changes for worker’s compensation liability) of $17.8 billion, a 1 percent increase.
- Transportation expenses increased by $105 million, or 6.3 percent, due to rising fuel costs. The Postal Service continues to decrease controllable costs, including an 8 million decrease in work hours, or 2.8 percent. Total compensation and benefits expenses decreased by $180 million, or 1.4 percent.
The Postal Service continues to suffer from a severe lack of liquidity. “Absent significant changes in the law to allow normal commercial freedoms, the Postal Service will default on both retiree health benefits pre-payments to the federal government due this year,” said Chief Financial Officer Joe Corbett. “Even if legislation changes or eliminates the prefunding payments, we may reach our $15 billion debt ceiling in the fall of this year.”
About USPS
A self-supporting government enterprise, the U.S. Postal Service is the only delivery service that reaches every address in the nation, 151 million residences, businesses and Post Office Boxes. The Postal Service receives no tax dollars for operating expenses, and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations. With 32,000 retail locations and the most frequently visited website in the federal government, usps.com, the Postal Service has annual revenue of more than $65 billion and delivers nearly 40 percent of the world’s mail. If it were a private sector company, the U.S. Postal Service would rank 35th in the 2011 Fortune 500. In 2011, the U.S. Postal Service was ranked number one in overall service performance, out of the top 20 wealthiest nations in the world, Oxford Strategic Consulting. Black Enterprise and Hispanic Business magazines ranked the Postal Service as a leader in workforce diversity. The Postal Service has been named the Most Trusted Government Agency for six years and the sixth Most Trusted Business in the nation by the Ponemon Institute.
Source: USPS.
