The Denver Network Distribution Facility, which processed record package volume last week.
Express Mail Clerk Kathleen Hamlin helps move Priority Mail Express parcels through the Denver P&DC.
The Postal Service delivered a record 28.3 million packages Dec. 22, surpassing the previous milestone — 27.9 million deliveries — set one week earlier.
The Dec. 22 deliveries were up 9.5 percent over the busiest day last year.
On Dec. 21, USPS delivered 6.3 million packages, the most delivered on a Sunday. The Postal Service is delivering packages on Sundays in more than 100 cities during the holidays.
USPS has delivered 422 million parcels since Nov. 30, nearing its prediction of at least 450 million package deliveries during the peak season.
Deliveries will continue during the next few days, including Christmas Day.
Overall, the Postal Service expects to deliver 15.5 billion cards, letters and packages between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve.
Postal facilities are setting records too.
For example, the West Valley P&DC in Phoenix processed more than 750,000 packages Dec. 17. Two days later, the Denver P&DC and Denver Network and Distribution Center processed a combined 954,000 packages.
“We were ready,” said Denver P&DC Senior Plant Manager Brian Gaines. “Our employees have been stepping up and moving the mail with efficiency and professionalism. This is our season and this proves it.”
This week’s record-setting performance has been covered by USA Today and others.
Yea great they are going after the package business but they better do a hell of a lot better job then this year.I am a retired letter carrier who sells on line and the tracking of packages this December has been terrible. I watch my clerk scan my scan sheet and nothing ever shows up. I have been told by a supervisor that the system could not handle all the scans. And that they in the cloud somewhere. So they better upgrade there software because they will differently lose business if this continues.
This has been the heaviest parcel season ever for our office, too. It’s good for all of us although we do tend to gripe about it. The Service isn’t dead, despite the terrible management. Our focus is shifting from the cards and letters of old, although some folks still like mailing Christmas cards to being the primary handler of e-commerce America. I myself order stuff online especially music, since there are no good record stores within 100 miles of my home town, and I don’t like and won’t use MP3 technology. The sound is inferior to CD’s, and if the player or computer fries without you going through all the backup crap your music is gone forever, and you don’t get liner notes, art work, etc. So at least 90% of my music comes from online purchases, and the USPS delivers almost all of them.
For once our local management has enough help to make the Christmas season easier, and one hopes the boost to the revenue will go a long way. As a 30 year city carrier, I work very hard anyway, and readers need to thank us for the work we do, in every type of weather imaginable. Yes it pays well, blah blah blah but a compliment brightens our day, and those are not very common from management, and in some offices non-existent.
There are and will always be bad apples out there, stealing mail, throwing packages without even bothering to get out of vehicles, etc., but that is a very small minority that makes us look lazy and crooked. Most of us are conscientious and care about what we’re doing. We’re tough and I have two more Christmas seasons before I get to retire and call it a day.