#nrlca

[lovethroughdelusions]

SUPPORT USPS

Some of you may have heard this already, but rural carriers in the USPS just got fucked over. (note: i myself am not a usps employee, but my partner is)

USPS and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association (NRLCA) have disagreed on how to price the volume of work for the rural routes. City (walking) routes get paid hourly, but rural routes get paid salaried. After disagreeing, the matter went to arbitration and the arbitor chose a complicated algorithm for determining the pay by volume, and it goes into effect this week. People are losing thousands of $ a year. Most between 5%-30% of their wage just.. gone. My partner only lost $4000 off their wage, but someone he works with lost $10,000 off their yearly income. A person on reddit is saying they lost $18,000.

The USPS always gets the short end of the stick, but this is going to throw things into chaos. USPS workers are unable to strike, so they don't have much ability to fight back. (though some have been talking about illegal strikes...) They can file a grievance within their union, but it's a gamble on if it will work.

How you can help: please make a fuss about this. Contact your local reps. Share this on social media. Tell your friends.

Thank you. ❤️❤️

Sources:

r/USPS

Route Changes Survey by ruralinfo.net

official NRLCA site

USPS and Striking

[roguekhajiit]

Storytime.

Keeping with the trend of avoiding politics right now, I wanna talk about a conversation I had at work.

As some of you may know, I'm a contracted mail carrier for the USPS. The routes I deliver on are very rural, too rural, even for the NRLCA (National Rural Letter Carriers' Association.

HC (highway contracted) routes look like this:

So, it can often be hard to tell that there is a house or houses located behind those trees, and oftentimes Google will be half a mile off on where an address is located.

So, last week, I was trying to find a house on my route to deliver a certified letter, I couldn't locate them, and Google was directing me to another street.

So, I had to leave them a notice in their mailbox telling them they needed to put their house number at the end of their driveway. Let me add here that the mailboxes on these routes are sometimes as far as a mile and a half from their door.

They showed up at the post office on Monday with the notice in hand, confused about why they had to make their house number visible from the street. The clerk kept trying to explain to them why, but they just weren't getting the picture. Eventually, the clerk approached me, frustrated, and asked me to please talk with them.

So, I go to talk to them and I tell them exactly why; because I couldn't find their house.

Where was 150 Main Street? The addresses on that road started at 170 Main Street. There wasn't another section of Main Street and it T-d with First Street. (All streets and addresses are generic and made up.) They told me that their address was 150 Main Street, but their driveway and front door were at the corner of First and Second Streets. (Um, what?!) They then told me that the EMTs also had a hard time finding their house. So, you already had a medical emergency that required an ambulance to be dispatched to your house, and you still didn't think to make it easier for first responders to find you? If emergency personnel can't find you, how can your mail carrier find you?

It took 3 people explaining this to them for 15 minutes for them to understand, "I need to put my address at the start of my driveway."

So yeah... make your address visible from the road people. It could be the difference between living to see another day or laying dead on your kitchen floor until your adult children finally decide to pay you a visit.

[liteblueinsider]

Stand with USPS Employees: A Vital Call for Support

In recent times, rural carriers at the United States Postal Service (USPS) have faced challenging circumstances, something that urgently calls for public awareness and action. My connection to this issue is more than just observational, as my partner is among the affected USPS employees.

The issue at hand stems from a dispute between USPS and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association (NRLCA) over the compensation model for rural postal routes. While urban carriers are paid hourly, rural carriers are salaried, a structure that has recently undergone significant changes. Following an arbitration decision, a complex algorithm was introduced to determine rural carriers' pay based on work volume, leading to drastic reductions in annual salaries.

The impact of this new compensation system is substantial, with many rural carriers seeing a decrease in their earnings by 5% to 30%. Personal stories, including my partner's $4,000 salary cut and reports of others losing up to $18,000 annually, illustrate the severity of the situation.

This recent development is another example of the challenges USPS workers face, compounded by their inability to strike, which limits their means of protest. While union grievances are an option, the effectiveness of such actions remains uncertain.

How can you help?

Amplify the Issue: Share this information on social media and other platforms to increase awareness. Visibility is key in advocacy.

Political Advocacy: Contact your local and national representatives to express your concerns. Political pressure can be a catalyst for change.

Start Conversations: Discuss this issue within your community. Public discourse can lead to a broader understanding and support for USPS workers.

Your support can make a significant difference in the lives of rural USPS carriers. By standing together, we can push for equitable treatment and fair compensation for these essential workers.

For more detailed insights into USPS employees' challenges, I recommend visiting resources like LiteBlueInsider, a dedicated platform providing valuable information and perspectives. Additionally, for official information about the USPS, you can refer to its USPS

[socialistalternative]

AUSTERITY MEASURES – THE NEW POSTAL WAY?

Published On March 8, 2015 | By Josh Smith 

I’m an organizer for Socialist Alternative in New Haven, a city carrier assistant for the United States Postal Service (USPS), and a member of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) Branch 19. You may have heard something about postal closures recently, with the effect of ending overnight first-class mail delivery to local destinations. As of mid-January, 82 mail processing plants began to close down, affecting approximately 15,000 postal workers’ jobs. USPS announced back in 2012 that they would be closing mail processing plants as part of an ongoing effort to cut costs. According to the Office of the Inspector General, the Postal Service consolidated 141 mail processing facilities in 2012 and 2013, resulting in a cost savings of approximately $865 million.

This is great for the organization’s bottom line, but we’ve got to ask where that money came from and why management is so desperate to save money at a time when the American economy is just coming back from a reeling recession. Government spending helps boost the economy, so why is top management implementing austerity measures?

As some of you may know, the U.S. Congress passed a bill that mandates the Postal Service to fund its retiree health benefits 75 years in advance, which is something that no business or government agency other than USPS is required to do. Without this mandate, USPS is actually extremely profitable. It could use profits to upgrade and repair facilities and equipment, boost workers’ pay and benefits, and freeze or reduce costs for customers. The organization also wouldn’t have to close any facilities and wouldn’t have to farm out services to corporations like Staples, which is a direct attack on the well-paying union jobs of my comrades in APWU, our clerks’ union.

The Postal Service management has cut 212,000 jobs since 2006, and enough is enough. The attacks on the livelihood of working people have got to stop. The four postal unions – APWU, NALC, NPMHU, and NRLCA – are strong, but they could be much stronger as part of a united workers’ organization. We’ve got to mobilize working-class people against these assaults on basic services like the post office as part of a more general fight against austerity policies. Such a fight will contribute to laying the foundation for our own political party that fights for our interests.

http://www.socialistalternative.org/2015/03/08/austerity-measures-postal-way/