Talking Points
Post Office Discontinuance Studies
What is going on?
The Postal Service is looking at all of its facilities to find any redundancies, inefficiencies or savings.  As part of this effort, your office is currently being studied for discontinuance. During the study, we will solicit feedback, measure our workload, evaluate customer impact, and determine availability of alternate retail and delivery services.

Why are you doing this?
Our extensive retail network of nearly 32,000 post offices, stations and branches has been left virtually untouched for decades — until now. As cities and towns expanded outward, most of the original infrastructure remained in place, resulting in a large network of offices currently located in areas where few people live, work and shop.

During the past two years, the Postal Service has experienced two multi-billion dollar deficits – and another big loss is projected for this year as well. Since we don’t receive tax revenue for our daily operations, we have to pay our own way and provide service that is also efficient.

Why don’t you cut elsewhere?
Over the last five years, we have initiated a number of savings, including:
•	Reduced our employee complement by more than 200,000
•	Reduced administrative and management ranks by 20% this year and 15% in 2009
•	Consolidated mail processing operations
•	Adjusted our delivery routes to reflect declining volumes

How will I get my mail?
We intend to fully live up to our Universal Service mandate. If this location closes, you will still get your mail through an alternate means, a carrier or another convenient location.

How will I get my stamps?
Almost anything you can do at a local Post Office, you can do at www.usps.com. You can buy stamps, purchase postage for a parcel or any of dozens of other products and services. There are thousands of other expanded access locations found at grocery stores, banks and drug stores, as well as Automated Postal Centers and Stamps by Mail.

When will this happen?
We are only in the study phase. We are simply gathering information, data and feedback so we can make a decision later. When we do make a decision, we will notify our customers immediately.

What will happen to the town’s ZIP Code?
In many cases, if the Post Office is closed, the community's identity as a postal address is preserved and the ZIP Code is preserved, if practical.

What about five-day delivery?
We’ve been talking to Congress to review the law that requires us to deliver mail six days a week, but that will take a change in the current laws governing the Postal Service.

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