USPS - Modernize or perish

My place in Wyoming doesn't even have an address. I have to drive a half hour into Laramie. Not a big deal.
Part of the problem that USPS has is all the mandates that .gov puts on them and does so without regard to increased cost. There is a postal commission that oversees the USPS and tells it what it can charge. It's a messed up situation in whole. They have had some good people who knew how to fix the problems but the .gov and union won't allow it.

To be fair, they made some amazing mistakes.
They've done nothing to modernize in a digital world.
The system is also rigged from the inside.

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Originally Posted by Averageman

To be fair, they made some amazing mistakes.
They've done nothing to modernize in a digital world.
The system is also rigged from the inside.

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In most non-US countries, the Post Office is a far more multi-function place. Part bank, part retail store and part shipping location. Unthreatening and usually somewhat customer focused. Unlike here, when you are told you are threatening a Federal employee if you ask why they lost your package.

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Originally Posted by Business_Casual

In most non-US countries, the Post Office is a far more multi-function place. Part bank, part retail store and part shipping location. Unthreatening and usually somewhat customer focused. Unlike here, when you are told you are threatening a Federal employee if you ask why they lost your package.

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I can vaguely recall some post offices here being country stores.

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Originally Posted by Business_Casual

In most non-US countries, the Post Office is a far more multi-function place. Part bank, part retail store and part shipping location. Unthreatening and usually somewhat customer focused. Unlike here, when you are told you are threatening a Federal employee if you ask why they lost your package.

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I used to pay almost all my bills at the Post Office with a credit card in Germany.
Walk in pay, walk out 2 hours worth of drama in five minutes.

The USPS will never be efficient period. There is no getting around bureaucracy in government.

I’m going to throw out there that for the practical functioning of privacy needed/desired by some people and situations, snail mail via a select group of people (versus seasonal package handlers at FedEx or PT box throwers at UPS; no judgement, we all start somewhere) under federal mandates is not a bad thing. In fact, I’d say it is an incredibly important thing.

I’m all about less gubmint. But we have some government organizations for good reason, and I elevate mail carrying to a very high level. I also have very strong (negative) feelings about public sector unions and slightly less strong feelings about unions in general under current federal law. But that doesn’t mean the service itself is unnecessary.

I’m not saying there (edit) SHOULDN’T be some slash and burn tactics enacted to achieve strategic goals like solvency.

There’s a reason Fedex, DHL and UPS are huge companies. Because the gigantic post office couldn’t deliver a package with your address written on it to you with any semblance of efficiency or alacrity. A lot of us have forgotten how hard to use and slow to deliver the USPS was only a few years ago. Competition actually improved them to their current sorry state from abysmal.

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Originally Posted by jsbhike

I can vaguely recall some post offices here being country stores.

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Last time I checked Klondike Arizona still had one.

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Originally Posted by Averageman

Last time I checked Klondike Arizona still had one.

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I like stuff like that. Been in a few old country stores that still sale nails, rope, fuels, food, and so on, but fewer and fewer and none is the community post office.