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Published: July 2011

Consumers lose with five-day mail delivery

Consumer Action sent a letter to members of Congress responding to a proposal to limit the postal service delivery to five days, rather than normal six.

Below is the full text of the letter:

Consumer Action wants to thank you for introducing your amendment to strike section 111 and preserve six-day mail delivery. Consumer Action opposes any efforts to reduce mail delivery to five days because we have serious concerns about how consumers in general, and low-income consumers particularly, may suffer should such plans be implemented.

Consumer Action is a nationwide nonprofit organization that has worked to advance consumer rights for four decades. We serve low and moderate-income consumers through our free multilingual publications, our free advice and referral hotline and our educational network of more than 8,000 community-based organizations.
We agree with you that many Americans rely on six-day mail delivery for essential items such as medications, time-sensitive legal documents, income and social security checks. Reducing delivery by even one day could harm consumers, especially the elderly who depend on their social security income, people waiting for mail order medication and rural consumers who do not have access to alternate electronic methods to pay bills or receive income.

The mail is commonly used not only as a safe, secure way to pay bills and to communicate with companies, but also to provide safety notices, recall advisories and product warranties, conduct the Census, submit voter registrations and distribute absentee ballots, deliver communications from medical providers, and to ship prescription drugs. Many programs designed to assist low- income consumers require use of the postal service in order to connect with their beneficiaries. For instance, during the 2009 DTV Transition, low-income Americans who applied for federal coupons to subsidize their digital converter box purchases could only receive them via mail. Likewise, in states like California, low-income consumers who wish to qualify for subsidized telephone rates under the state’s “Lifeline” program must use the postal service in order to qualify for the benefit if they don’t already receive federal benefits like food stamps.

Among our concerns is that consumers would be harmed by an increase in penalty late fees if this bill were to pass. There are two reasons for this. Statements from phone companies, utilities and credit card banks for many consumers could arrive later than anticipated, resulting in financial harm to those accustomed to the old six-day system. Not only that, but payments mailed by consumers that would have been received on Saturday would not arrive until the following Monday. Online bill payment, while convenient for many, is no panacea for this problem. We should stress that many payments characterized as “online bill payments” actually are initiated online by the consumer, and then require the bank to issue a paper check, sent through regular mail. For this reason, greater use of electronic bill payment will not eliminate the harm to consumers through late payments and penalty fees.

Although it has been suggested that an increasingly wired, online world makes the postal service anachronistic, we believe that this online vs. “snail mail” distinction is a false dichotomy. It is worth noting that in many cases, online commerce directly depends upon a strong universal postal service. Netflix, eBay, and other entrepreneurial success stories of the Internet age would not have experienced the growth and success they enjoyed without a robust USPS and six-day service.

The USPS is the oldest of America’s public services, and has long been one of the institutions that binds us together as a nation. In addition to its role as a vital civic institution, the postal service also provides some of the infrastructure that citizens use to participate in our democracy. In addition to the use of absentee ballots, some counties in Washington and the entire state of Oregon require citizens to vote by mail. Reducing service could reduce the level of participatory democracy, not only by weakening a time-honored community institution, but also by making it more difficult for some to participate in the process itself.

Consumer Action believes that the postal service is an indispensable public service, particularly for the low and moderate-income consumers we serve. These consumers cannot afford to use the more expensive options provided by UPS and Federal Express that provide deliveries six days a week. We urge you and your colleagues to reject efforts to reduce mail deliver to five days per week.

Lead Organization

Consumer Action

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