The following are excerpts from the UPS OIG audit report:
The U.S. Postal Service ended fiscal year (FY) 2012 with a record net loss of $15.9 billion. This followed a net loss of $5.1 billion for the previous year. In an effort to reduce costs and improve staffing flexibility, the Postal Service and the American Postal Workers Union agreed to create two new flexible employee categories: non-traditional full-time and postal support employee positions, effective May 23, 2011. The Postal Service estimates significant cost savings in utilizing these new employee categories. The non-traditional full-time position is a bid position with a regular weekly schedule of 30-48 hours, while the postal support employee position is a part-time non-career position that may be scheduled for as few as 2 hours a day or as many as 40 or more hours in a work week. This position may not exceed 360 calendar days per appointment.
Our objective was to assess the use of non-traditional full-time and postal support employee positions. This report responds to a request from the postmaster general.
WHAT THE OIG FOUND:
While Postal Service managers showed improvement in increasing the use of both positions, they have not hired to the fullest extent allowed by the contract. For example, of total clerk positions in FY 2012, non-traditional full-time employees increased from 507 at the beginning of the year to 3,708 at the end of the year. Postal support employees increased from 5,632 to 7,559. The use of flexible positions was hindered by:
Employees’ reluctance to bid on non-traditional full-time positions of less than 40 hours per week.
Difficulties in staffing and scheduling non-traditional full-time employees. This was largely attributed to lack of supervisor training.
Lack of available positions in some plants.
Consequently, if the Postal Service hired postal support employees up to contract limits, it could have reduced labor and overtime costs in FY 2012 by more than $30.6 million.
WHAT THE OIG RECOMMENDED
We recommended the vice president, Network Operations, direct managers to provide additional training to improve the utilization and supervision of non-traditional full-time positions and periodically evaluate postal support employee staffing to optimize usage of these employees.
This report presents the results of our audit of the Use of Non-Traditional Full-Time (NTFT) and Postal Support Employee (PSE) Positions in Processing Operations (Project Number 13YG002NO000). Our objective was to assess the use of NTFT and PSE positions. This report responds to a request from the postmaster general and addresses operational risk. See Appendix A for additional information about this audit.
The 2010-2015 National Agreement between the U.S. Postal Service and the American Postal Workers Union (APWU), effective May 23, 2011, created two new employee categories:
The NTFT duty assignments, part of the full-time employee complement, are comprised of regular weekly schedules with total hours of between 30-48. Management may change the start times and off days of these employees from week to week. If the NTFT schedule has 3 or more scheduled days off, at least 2 days must be consecutive.
The PSE is comprised of non-career, bargaining unit employees who replaced casual employees.1 These employees must pass a test and may not exceed 360 calendar days per appointment. While there is no guarantee of regular hours, a PSE must work a minimum of 2 hours when scheduled.
Management intended these two employee categories to help the Postal Service reduce costs and improve flexibility. The Joint Contract Interpretation Manual (JCIM), effective August 27, 2011, eliminated part-time flexible (PTF), part-time regular (PTR), and casual clerks working in processing and distribution center (P&DC) Function 1 operations.2
While Postal Service managers showed improvement in increasing the use of both positions, they did not hire to the fullest extent allowed by the contract.
The use of flexible positions was hindered by:
Employees’ reluctance to bid on NTFT positions of less than 40 hours per week.
Difficulties in staffing and scheduling NTFT employees. This was largely attributed to lack of supervisor training.
Lack of available positions at some plants due to overstaffing.
Consequently, if the Postal Service had hired PSEs up to contract limits, it could have reduced labor and overtime costs, resulting in savings of more than $30.6 million in fiscal year (FY) 2012.
Non-Traditional Full-Time and Postal Support Employee Utilization
While Postal Service managers showed improvement in increasing the use of both types of positions in FY 2012, they did not hire to the fullest extent allowed by the contract.3 For example, in October 2011, there were 507 NTFT positions (.8 percent of total mail processing clerks) and by September 2012, the number of these positions had increased to 3,708 (5.7 percent of clerks). Similarly, the average number of NTFT positions increased from 2,732 in FY 2012 to 3,631 in the first 5 months of FY 2013. However, in spite of this improvement, the use of NTFT employees was still significantly below the amount allowed by the contract, which is 50 percent of total clerks in a district. For FY 2012, the maximum number of allowable NTFT employees averaged 33,335 employees (see Figure1).
In October 2011, there were 5,632 PSE positions (8.5 percent of the mail processing clerks) and, by September 2012, these positions had increased to 7,559 (11.6 percent of the clerks). Beginning in October 2012, hiring of PSEs accelerated and for the first 5 months of FY 2013, the average number of PSEs rose to 10,114 (or 15.4 percent of the clerks). By February 2013, accelerated hiring combined with the reduction in staff resulting from retirement incentives helped the Postal Service reach 12,170 PSE positions, or 19.5 percent of the clerk workforce (see Figure 2).
SO what can WE do? Is the USPS OIG process a worthy one?…even wanting to do the right thing for everyone leaves you wondering if it’s the wrong thing for you. Fear of retaliation, which is an ongoing experience, is at the forefront of these considerations. In an understaffed rural SLC office, the carrier 204B sent back 700+ certified letters UNCLAIMED that hadn’t been given 2nd notice simply because there were too many to go through. This was the worst of 3 similar occurrences since the beginning of 2013-purging/returning of certified letters because it’s easier than going through their due process. What can be done? What is a worthy process which ensures this service to the customer and corrects the carrier 204B methods-in conjunction with the former Boise Postmaster that condones and claims reports can’t be generated to prove the wrongdoing?! Is the USPS OIG process going to protect management despite their behavior towards the sanctity of the mail?
Well at my plant and city, we had to let go of PSEs because we were over quota. Solution= everybody works 6 days a week, you can even do 7 if your not maxed out. So we’re all working our tails off. They even had to move tour 3 PSEs to tour 1 hours because we’re so short handed. So there’s more than enough slots to be filling in KC. But if they don’t turn people regular one of these days its never going change. Even with our tour 3 PSEs hours changed we’re still short handed on tour 1. But let’s keep consolidating the plants and adding more work, since its too far for those people to transfer. Makes total sense.?!
Tim you don’t pay attention much….They are allowed to get benefits if they work 30 hours or more….Thats the Obama care rule….5 Day here we come….
Christine Lawlor’s post took the words right out of my mouth. I wholeheartedly agree that this is indeed the plan of upper postal management.
IF YOU A CCA OR PSE, TRY TO FIND SOMETHING ELSE IS WORTH OF YOUR TIME AND YOUR LIFE. P O JUST USING YOU AS LONG AS THEY CAN TO KEEP YOU WITHOUT ANY BENEFITS. GET OUT BEFORE IT TOO LATE.
Everyone needs to remember the PSE’s are new employees and wether you get a PSE or a PTF the employee doesn’t know much….They have to be trained CORRECTLY to learn the job…If that same PSE came in as PTF they would be the same, just a different title…The problem with the Postal Service is too many people expect overtime for doing nothing. My office the regulars are slugs and the CCA’s and PSE’s are the ones working hard…..The Postal way do as little as possible and to get paid and that is not right…I never seen so many people come to work that don’t want to work…Things need to change
In the office where I work, the pse’s are the ones doing all of the work. The regulars are lazy and try to sabotage the work flow just to get penalty overtime
The PSE in our office is sleeping with the boss. She gets over the max hours 1/2 day Saturdays and any job she feels like doing . The other PSEs have to go to other stations and she gets to stay in the office. Never gets sent home early. Always texting and causing trouble in the office. What a joke. Glad im close to the end.
The OIG needs to be a little more timely in putting out their reports….While this report may have been valid at the end of September the current report needs to talk about how much money the USPS is going to lose in grievances because they have hired more PSEs than the contract allows.
After all the recent PSE hires and the APWU retirements the USPS currently has thousands more PSEs hired than the contract allows.
When I began working at the postal service years ago I found it hard to believe one day when I saw a custodian washing and waxing his supervisor’s car in the employee parking lot while on the clock. Years later I have learned that was normal. There are a lot of problems with the postal service and of those problems have to do with management. I wonder if the postal service is capable of saving its self. I do not believe that real reform is possible and maybe the experiment of a semi public private government entity should end and return the postal service back in to the rank with the other tax payer funded agencies.
Christine Lawlor put it in the exact words I would have used, it I got to the page first.
WHY isn’t our government catching on to the fact that the USPS is destroying itself on purpose!!! Every change they make costs millions! The closings and consolidations DO NOT SAVE MONEY!!! They COST MORE MONEY!!!! Why haven’t they caught on???? Because it is a conspiracy to destroy the USPS so that it can be privatized and bought up by the PMG, Politicians, ALEC, The Koch Brothers, FED EX and UPS! Then the prefund will stop, the USPS will again be in the RED and all these thieves will pocket he profits!!! WAKE UP!!!!!
How can closing a facility that costs 99 cents a year with a 99 yr lease, then transporting the mail (at an additional cost of more than $5 million) 96+ miles to another facility (that is spending more than $5 million to expand) to be worked and then transported back for delivery, while the mail is delayed SAVING MONEY??? It is NOT!!!! Meanwhile employees across the country are being paid to sit in empty facilities, doing nothing, while the USPS hires PSE’s and MHA’s to work the mail on a reduced salary and no benefits at the facilities “gaining” the mail!!!! This is ABSURD!!!! And a DISGRACE!!!!
WOW $30,6 million saved from $15.9 BILLION loss. Get real
Yea…blame everybody but the authors of the “Contract” with language so vague and so many loopholes(..added after the ratification vote) that you can drive a Mack truck through them!
so this is how the lazy, incompetent idiots at the OIG office spend their time? i think the next big project for the clowns in the OIG offices should be to do an ‘investigation’ into whether postmaster general patrick donahoe is a habitual liar, a compulsive liar, or a pathological liar?
after following donahoe’s actions the last several years i am 100% convinced donahoe qualifies for one or more of these titles under the standard psychology guidelines.
so, have at it boys in the OIG offices. i’ll wait patiently for your findings and publically announced results of your ‘investigation.’
Oh wow. Thanks OIG. I’m glad you don’t make the decisions. How about the OIG take NTFT positions??? It’s no surprise that people aren’t bidding on these assignments. Why would they??? OIG should be RIF’d!!!
The real problem is management!!!!! They have have increased in size while all other areas have reduced staffing. The majority of them could not manage a burger king.
You bastards screw you what kind of crap system is that pay less no benny’s I can’t wait to get out. these people in our government a greedy and useless I hope they all rot in hell
90 days? In Texas most don’t even make it brought the first week
In Indianapolis that said they had hired too many PSE’s. So they let over 100 of them go after working only 90 days.
Difficulties in staffing and scheduling non-traditional full-time employees. This was largely attributed to lack of supervisor training.
This says it all. These buffoons they call supervisors couldn’t schedule help at a one man lemonade stand. Training or not, it shouldn’t be rocket science to schedule 3, 4, 5 employees effectively. If there’s no work, send the ptf home and save money-duh. Wonder if Donahoe has even a remote idea how much his hired help out there doesn’t care.
This story has so many loopholes, Apple should be able to gain some money from it. Why would the USPS want to hire MORE employees than needed? The APWU USPS contract also calls for DESIRABLE DUTY ASSIGNMENTS to be created. It is not desirable to want to work only 30-39 hours with days off of tue wed and thur or the such. The OIG is not properly evaluating anything. Under the OIG theory, the USPS should hire thousands and thousands more PSE’s and schedule them for only 2 hours each, at least then we’ have hired pse’s to the fullest. But then that would be stupid because how many would actually stay kknowing they are getting only 2 hours a day? The OIG needs to investigate thoroughly why Postal Management is getting raises when the ship is sinking.
From my experience trying to get most PSEs to do half the work is a challenge in itself, but then again I’m not a high caliber postal supervisor. As for the NTFTs, I would suggest the OIG people go to a 30 hour week. I would like to see how much that would save.
The OIG has nothing to do with getting the mail delivered and should be more expendable than anybody else.