Post Office to Cut Saturday Service

The U.S. Postal Service plans to end Saturday delivery as part of a strategy to halt losses at an agency that hemorrhaged $15.9 billion in its most recent fiscal year.

The postal service is set to stop Saturday mail delivery to homes and businesses on Aug. 1 but will continue to deliver packages on Saturdays and post-office boxes would continue to receive mail on Saturdays.

Postmaster general Patrick Donahue.

"We're predicting that we will be able to reduce about 45 million work hours making these changes," Postmaster General Patrick Donahue said. "Seventy percent of Americans have consistently said they would support a five day schedule of mail and package delivery given the financial condition of the post service.

"If you put something in the mail Friday that would have normally been delivered Saturday, it will be delivered Monday," he added. "If it's something that's going across the country, it will still be delivered Monday or Tuesday."

In other efforts to cut costs, the USPS has closed or consolidated dozens of mail-processing plants and relocated or cut hours at many post offices.

The annual loss for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 was the largest in USPS history. The loss in large part reflects a default on $11.1 billion in required retiree health benefit payments and the continued decline in first class mail volume.