Home-based business opportunity and other small business owners, particularly those who work in more outlying areas where six-day-a-week mail delivery can be a real lifeline to the outside world, may be affected by the U.S. Postal Service’s (USPS) latest strategy to staunch its fiscal bleeding. A fully self-supporting enterprise that receives no tax dollars for its operating expenses, the USPS has been in the red for quite some time, thanks in large part to the advent of the internet and the changes in consumer mailing habits that have evolved as a result.
Where online bill pay has become, for many of us, a dream come true, for the USPS it’s been somewhat of a nightmare, resulting in millions of dollars in losses over the last few years. Recent cost-cutting measures designed to keep the USPS afloat have included consolidating smaller, oftentimes more rural post office locations and reducing its career workforce by a full 28 percent. This newest strategy to modify the current mail delivery schedule is anticipated to save approximately $2 billion per year.
Beginning the week of August 5, 2013, mail delivery to street addresses will no longer occur on Saturdays, but will remain as is Monday through Friday. Packages of ALL sizes and mail addressed to P.O. boxes, however, will continue to be delivered six days a week. Post offices that are currently open on Saturdays will also remain open.
This new approach, while endorsed by as much as 70% of the American public, is designed to minimize any negative impact on businesses and consumers who rely heavily on e-commerce and direct mail marketing for their survival and growth. However, its potential effects remain a source of concern to many, among them Democratic Senator Mark Begich of Alaska. This is especially “bad news for Alaskans and small business owners,” he said, many of whom rely heavily on the timely delivery of mail to rural areas.
Echoing his sentiment is Fredric Rolando, president of the National Association of Letter Carriers, who called this latest cutback “a disastrous idea.” It’s one “that would have a profoundly negative effect on the Postal Service and on millions of customers,” particularly businesses, rural communities, the elderly, the disabled and others who depend on Saturday delivery for commerce and communication,” he said.
The USPS is the only delivery service that can and does reach every address in the nation—151 million residences, businesses and P.O. boxes—on a routine daily basis. In fact, it delivers nearly 40 percent of the world’s mail and routinely has been named by the public over many years as the Most Trusted Government Agency.
For more information on the USPS’ new delivery schedule beginning in August of 2013, click here now!
READERS: Please weigh in! When it comes to this issue, we want to hear from you! How do you think this latest move by the USPS might affect your home-based, online or other small business opportunity, franchise or other small business? Why?