FIRST-CLASS LETTERS FALTER AGAIN.
First-Class mail fell back down into mediocrity after a brief moment of almost OK service in last week’s report. This week, First-Class fell back below the YTD average, and First-Class flats fell off a cliff with average delivery times of more than six days. (As always, I do like to point out that our flats sample is very small.)
Marketing Mail continued a decent performance, although flats are traveling more slowly than we’d like. They are still beating YTD averages, though, so we shouldn’t complain.
Why was First-Class performance so bad? It’s the Central Area, which was just awful with First-Class Mail. Barely 50% of First-Class letters that originated in the Central Area were delivered on time. One theory is that Central Area origin stations are overloaded by a flood of mail from many of the largest mailers in the country, suddenly without a DNDC discount dropping at local facilities.
All of the regions were worse than the prior week, but Central stands out.
