Many small daily papers have stopped using carriers for delivery and are using the post office instead, and the News Media Alliance, led by dailies, has joined the National Newspaper Association, led by weeklies, to ask that the USPS performance measurement system keep track of newspaper delivery.
NNA and NMA filed joint comments before the Postal Regulatory Commission in a docket set up by USPS to change the way the service provides its public reports for on-time service performance, they said in a member alert. New delivery standards take effect in October, so USPS plans to provide new categories of information for first class mail.
"NNA and NMA reminded the PRC that the Postal Service relies upon scans from automated sorting machines to compile its data on where mail is and how reliably it is delivered," the NNA member alert said. "But because newspapers are not generally sorted by automated sorting machines in mail plants, newspaper mail is not scanned."
Post offices have improved delivery of periodicals since a big drop in service last fall, when the pandemic increased postal-worker absenteeism and raised package volume, the release noted. The latest report says 79% of periodicals were delivered on time, up 2.1 points from the same time year.
Those numbers do not include newspapers, which NNA and NMA called "a major flaw, both in capturing the whole picture of USPS performance for regulators and in failing to give the public meaningful information on why there are delivery problems." Not only are newspapers in mail processing facilities sorted manually, but those entered directly into a post office (as many if not most weeklies do) never enter the national mail processing system.
NNA and NMA filed joint comments before the Postal Regulatory Commission in a docket set up by USPS to change the way the service provides its public reports for on-time service performance, they said in a member alert. New delivery standards take effect in October, so USPS plans to provide new categories of information for first class mail.
"NNA and NMA reminded the PRC that the Postal Service relies upon scans from automated sorting machines to compile its data on where mail is and how reliably it is delivered," the NNA member alert said. "But because newspapers are not generally sorted by automated sorting machines in mail plants, newspaper mail is not scanned."
Post offices have improved delivery of periodicals since a big drop in service last fall, when the pandemic increased postal-worker absenteeism and raised package volume, the release noted. The latest report says 79% of periodicals were delivered on time, up 2.1 points from the same time year.
Those numbers do not include newspapers, which NNA and NMA called "a major flaw, both in capturing the whole picture of USPS performance for regulators and in failing to give the public meaningful information on why there are delivery problems." Not only are newspapers in mail processing facilities sorted manually, but those entered directly into a post office (as many if not most weeklies do) never enter the national mail processing system.
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