Still Debating Saturday Mail Delivery
Despite a strong recommendation from the Postmaster General that the USPS eliminate Saturday mail delivery (along with other cost-cutting moves and a rate increase), the issue is far from settled. In late July, Senator Jon Testor (D-Mont) said that the senators who oversee the US Postal Service's budget will block the proposal to stop delivering mail on Saturdays. The USPS cannot cut services without agreement from Congress.
Doc's a bit on the fence about the Saturday mail delivery conundrum. The USPS is on track to lose $7 billion this fiscal year, so something has to be done. But there is a large concern among direct marketers and transactional printers that eliminating Saturday mail delivery will have a measurable affect on commerce, and hit rural areas particularly hard.
For a good read on the subject, check out this article from the New York Times.
As federal regulators consider a proposal to cut most Saturday postal deliveries, the business community is sharply divided about the consequences of switching to five-day service.
The post office estimates that cutting Saturday delivery would save $3 billion a year. Some, like Donald J. Hall Jr., chief executive of Hallmark Cards, said that eliminating Saturday delivery and raising prices even incrementally would drive more business away from the United States Postal Service, resulting in a "slippery slope."
But others, like Andrew Rendich, the chief service and DVD operations officer at Netflix, said five-day delivery would be a better alternative to significantly higher postal rates. "Big rate increases will absolutely squash business and will absolutely slow growth for a company like Netflix," Mr. Rendich said.
Doc wonders where you stand on the issue, especially if you do a lot of transactional printing and regularly send out customer correspondence. Many people I've talked to wish the USPS would eliminate one of the weekdays, since Saturday is traditionally a good day to get mail directly in people's hands (when they are not at work and have time to deal with it right away). So which is better, elimination of Saturday mail delivery or a big rate increase? The way it's looking now, we may be headed toward a combination of both!