In May of 2023 the OIG’s office published a report assessing the effectiveness of the Postal Service’s plans to resolve post office suspensions. This follows the 2018 report wherein the OIG recommended that the USPS develop enhanced policies for tracking suspended post offices.
The USPS has had a history of suspending service at a postal facility and failing to resolve the suspension. In the past some buildings have been on the suspended list for years. USPS policy is that suspensions should be resolved by either re-opening or permanently closing the facility in 180 to 280 days, depending on the cause of the suspension. Since 2020 the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) has required the USPS provide a detailed plan of suspended post office resolutions in the USPS Annual Compliance Report. The USPS uses a Change Suspension Discontinuance Center (CSDC) system to track progress of a facility through the suspension process.
Suspensions are created by stopping operations at a Postal Service-operated retail facility generally due to emergencies “or other considerations” such as damage from a natural disaster, termination of a lease or rental agreement, lack of qualified personnel to operate the facility, irreparable or severe damage to a retail facility, or the lack of adequate measures to safeguard the facility or its revenues.
In addition to concerns raised by the PRC, Congress has long had an interest in suspended postal facilities as it can be seen as a means of closing a facility without following prescribed guidelines. Guidelines include, among other things, a required 60-day advance notice of closure to persons affected by such closure. This notice time is intended to give those people time and opportunity to present their views on the closure at a public meeting. The PRC is tasked with making sure the USPS follows required procedures.
In 2016 the USPS had a backlog of over 600 unresolved suspensions. Currently that number is less than 400. Clearly improvements have been made. Still the OIG made formal Recommendations to the USPS for making further improvements.
First the OIG recommended that the Vice President, Retail and Post Office Operations update policies and procedures applicable to the post office suspension process to reflect current organization structure and assigned responsibilities.
Second, the OIG Recommended that the Vice President, Retail and Post office Operations develop a process to formally document and monitor implementation of current and future plans to resolve post office suspensions as reported in the Annual Compliance Reports.
The USPS is in agreement with these recommendations.
Read the 2018 Report on post office suspensions
Read the FY 2022 Annual Compliance Report Document. Retail facility suspensions are covered in pages 177 through 182