Audit finds numerous problems at postal facility handling OBX/NENC mail
The Richmond-area processing facility that now handles all mail to-and-from northeastern North Carolina and the Outer Banks has been plagued by multiple problems according to a U.S. Postal Service audit.
According to Axios Richmond, the 35-page report found chronic understaffing, misplaced letters and packages, and a poorly executed transition of the facility in Sandston, Virginia to a regional facility.
In July, the facility became the first in the nation to transition from a local to a regional postal hub as part of the U.S. postmaster general’s 10-year plan to modernize the postal service.
Around that same time, residents and business across ZIP codes that start with “279” began reporting numerous issues with mail being slow or missing altogether.
Previously, mail from northeastern North Carolina was processed at a facility in Rocky Mount.
Axios Richmond says the USPS inspector general reviewed operations at the Henrico County facility during its first four months under the new system, from July 29 through December 1, 2023.
Inspectors also visited in person in October. Among the most shocking findings in their report released Monday:
- A 2022 audit found understaffing, high rates of employee absenteeism, low productivity, and a lack of training for existing managers at the Richmond facility. Those issues persisted under the new model.
- Inspectors observed “multiple instances” of Richmond postal employees “not engaged with work,” including one staffer sleeping on a forklift.
- A lack of attention to detail that resulted in lost mail, packages sitting on the floor, and manual sorting methods used for “machinable mail.”
- Over 2-month-old mail left (and wet) in a container in the truck yard
- Priority Express mail mixed in with packages containing “hazardous materials.”
Plus, inspectors noted that USPS did not adequately communicate the plan or flow of the transition to local managers.
According to the inspector general’s report, “the challenges caused the Postal Service to incur additional labor and transportation costs, totaling over $8 million in questioned costs over the first four months of operations.”
“The challenges also contributed to a decrease in service performance for the Richmond region that continued four months after launch,” the inspector general office said.
Recommendations made by the report included:
“Continuing to identify and address issues post launch; developing procedures to mitigate challenges before launch; coordinating the training for local managers to understand roles and responsibilities, engagement, leadership, and adequate supervision of operations; adopting a service performance measure of success; aligning and validating transportation schedules; recovering overpayments; establishing a process to communicate and solicit feedback from all local managers in the RP&DC region; updating its Mail Processing Facility Review policy.”
But they disagreed with the report calling for the postal service to communicate “impacts to communities when moving processing operations for an entire 3-digit ZIP Code to another facility”.
The USPS pushed back on the audit finding the changes automatically equal poor mail delivery, and said it would only communicate future ones when needed.
No one needed an audit to notice the degrading service provided by the Postal Service.
Is it any surprise that “the USPS pushed back on the audit,” instead of properly apologizing and vowing to improve service?
Never has it been more clear that the USPS is dying. Meanwhile it keeps running TV ads boasting about all the modernizing it has been doing.
Well, that’s a good reason not to appoint someone from the private freight sector, who would like to see the USPS die, to run the USPS (into the ground, purposely). Let’s hear it for Louis DeJoy.