Bloomberg: Following union-backed boycotts and an adverse labor board ruling, the United States Postal Service has agreed to curb a controversial arrangement allowing private employees to provide its services at Staples Inc. stores. USPS spokeswoman Darlene Casey told Bloomberg that the Postal Service would end its relationship with Staples in order to comply with a National Labor Relations Board judge’s ruling. The cancellation is … Read More
Postal Service to halt retail sales at Staples stores after union complaints
Washington Post: When the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) and Staples birthed a retail partnership in 2013, USPS said “it’s time to celebrate.” But now, that program has been sentenced to death and it is postal labor leaders who are rejoicing. They cheer the demise of a program that had been the target of a vigorous campaign by postal unions that don’t … Read More
USPS-APWU arbitration decision puts moratorium on plant consolidations and outsourcing retail
he Postal Service and the American Postal Workers Union have a new contract. Last week, the arbitrator on the case, Stephen Goldberg, issued his decision and award, thus ending a two-year dispute. The new contract provides protections against layoffs for all career employees (who were on the rolls as of July 8), puts limits on more subcontracting, and converts many noncareer employees in maintenance and motor … Read More
The Postal Service’s “Retail Channel Strategy”: A blueprint for privatizing the post office
It’s been clear for a long time that the Postal Service is in the process of privatizing itself by shifting processing operations to companies like Pitney Bowes through the workshare system and contracting out billions of dollars of work to private corporations (over $12 billion in 2014). The Postal Service has also been working to privatize its retail operations by … Read More
Postal Service begins expanding into 1500 Staples
The Postal Service announced back in July that it was ending its pilot program to put mini-post offices in Staples stores. The 82 postal counters it had set up last October would be transitioned to the Approved Shipper program, which has been around for years without causing much controversy. (The Postal Service explained the transition in this blog post.) At the … Read More
Giving Away the Store: The Postal Service discounts the mail
MARK JAMISON In her book Captive Audience: The Telecom Industry and Monopoly Power in the New Gilded Age, Susan Crawford describes how the American public has been imprisoned by monopoly arrangements in the delivery of broadband and wireless Internet services. Using pricing and discount strategies, communications corporations have colluded to circumvent competition and make private fiefdoms out of what should … Read More
WaPo: Staples’ selling postal products without USPS workers stirs fears of privatization
Washington Post: With its steep financial challenges, the U.S. Postal Service desperately needs to find innovative solutions, including new ways to deliver services to the public. A pilot project with Staples stores around the nation does that. But feeling ignored in this equation are postal workers left watching as their jobs go to private employers who can pay their employees less, … Read More
State AFL-CIO Federations to Staples: Postal Workers and Customers Deserve Better
APWU Web News: Local union leaders are winning allies for the union’s campaign against a pilot program that placed postal retail centers in more than 80 Staples stores, reports Northeast Region Coordinator John Dirzius. Jim Bertolone, President of the Rochester Area Local, and Mike Dennehy, Vice President of the Greater CT Area Local, asked their state AFL-CIO federations to send letters … Read More
Postal Workers Deliver Protest Letters to Staples
\Postal workers with the NY Metro Area Postal Union walked from their union offices to Staples on 35th Street Avenue to deliver protest letters to Staples management indicating they aren’t happy with the stationary store hiring what they say are low-wage, non-union workers to work in the stores’ postal units.
Postal Workers Deliver Protest Letters to Staples in NYC
Postal workers with the NY Metro Area Postal Union sent delegations to three Staples stores on January 8 and 9 to deliver letters protesting the establishment of postal retail units staffed by low-wage, non-union, non-postal workers. The national action is set for January 18, but New York union members weren't waiting. Chuck Zlatkin, legislative and political director for the union, said the union … Read More
Staplizing the Post Office: A dozen reasons to just say no
Back in November, the Postal Service quietly announced that it was setting up postal counters in a couple of Staples stores in San Jose and South San Francisco. The website Going Postal broke the Staples story a few days later with its report about a pilot program that included 82 Staples stores in areas around San Francisco, San Diego, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, and west of Boston. … Read More
The next chapter in postal privatization: Post Offices inside of Staples
The Postal Service has rather quietly announced a pilot program to put post offices inside of Staples. It’s part of what the USPS is calling the Retail Partner Expansion Program, and the first Staples to host a post office will be located in San Francisco and San Jose. According to an article in the Burlingame-Hillsborough Patch, which was apparently based on … Read More
