Federal Times has noted that "The U.S. Postal Service has frequently failed to justify millions of dollars worth of "workshare discounts" given to mailers for efficiency reasons and other grounds, a newly released audit by the USPS inspector general has found. Under the discount program, mailers get reduced postage rates in return for preparing, sorting or transporting mail. The Postal Service is supposed to come out ahead by saving more in avoided costs than it loses from lower rates. A 2006 law allows for some exceptions, however, as when postal officials believe that reducing or eliminating the discount would get in the way of efficient operations. But in 2009 the Postal Service failed to properly justify 19 out of 30 workshare discounts that exceeded avoided costs by $104 million, the IG found. Almost all of those 19 were allowed under the efficiency exception, but the Postal Service "did not identify specific operations that would be impeded, or quantify the potential impact of setting workshare discounts equal to or less than avoided costs," according to the Dec. 23 audit, which was released Thursday. The Postal Service also did not provide data for some educational, cultural, scientific or other informational mail to prove their discounts were necessary, the report said. Without adequate justification, the inspector general found, some mailers could benefit from discounts at other mailers' expense. And excessive discounts could cost the Postal Service money and lead to inefficiencies in mail processing, the report said." Read more!
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