A reader recently wrote to say that after 15 years of reading our diatribes against the USPS, he was tired of them.
We can sympathize, because we’re getting sick of writing them.
It just isn’t very much fun covering the postal service, and you should appreciate our hard work.
Let’s say the postal service does something obnoxious, like file a rate case. We have to report on it, no matter how busy we are covering mass layoffs at USPS client firms.
Do you think it’s easy wading through 600 pages of incandescent BS? We’re so bad at math that the USPS’s figures never seem to add up.
Take the recent announcement that rates are going up again in July by “only 1.6%.”
Well, things are so tight in some firms these days that people have to justify every $500 expenditure.
But let’s examine that 1.6%. Let’s say you spend $10 million a year on postage, which many of our readers do. You’ve just gotten hit with an unexpected $160,000 in costs (on top of the $400,000 extra you were socked with in January).
We don’t know about you, but that ain’t chump change at our place.
Then there’s the story about the USPS breaking up next year’s anticipated 15% increase over three years. That, too, required more arithmetic than we would have liked.
Five percent a year doesn’t sound that bad when you can plan for it, but very good sources say the increase will be closer to 20%, which means that that 5% could end up being 6% (assuming we don’t get slammed with the whole thing at once). But we had trouble figuring out one-third of 17.8% and 18.3%, the sort of figures the USPS tends to go for. It’s all very confusing.
But back to our readers. Another non-fan of the postal service, David Springer of SportsList Direct Mail, wrote to say he was amused by two recent headlines on our DIRECT Newsline.
The First: “Poor Report Card for U.S. Postal Service.”
The Second: “PMG Henderson to Receive DMD’s Lifetime Achievement Award.”
“Ironic, isn’t it?” David wrote.
We’ll say. Not that we have anything against Henderson the Rain King. He has served his time. But has he really “demonstrated support for and expansion of the direct marketing concept”?
It’s hard to square that with three increases in less than two years.
We don’t always agree with columnist Robert Novak, but he was right when he called the USPS “dysfunctional,” and said that President Bush should do something about it.
Just one thing, Mr. President: Bring a calculator when you do.
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