USPS losing money by “under-charging competitors such as UPS and FedEx”, says US Senator
US Senator Claire McCaskill has questioned the US Postal Service’s pricing for its last mile of delivery in rural areas, and also suggested that USPS “may be losing money by under-charging competitors such as UPS and Fedex to carry mail to those areas”. Senator McCaskill is a senior member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which has jurisdiction over the Postal Service.
In a statement issued on Thursday (21 April), the Senator said: “We are giving a really good deal to our competitors. I’ve never seen another business entity who says, because we are so starving for volume, we’re going to take the most expensive part of our architecture, which is the last mile, and we’re going to give our competitors a deal on that last mile.
“And I have yet to have anyone give me the analysis that shows me that they have, in fact, at the Postal Service, considered what price they’re giving to UPS and FedEx for that last mile of delivery as it relates to our costs.”
Senator McCaskill recently backed the Rural Postal Act, a bill sponsored by Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota that would restore overnight delivery, return a faster First-Class mail standard, make six-day delivery permanent, and enact strict criteria the Postal Service would have to meet before closing a post office.
