The U.S. Post Offices at Fork and Little Rock went from six to four hours of retail service as part of PostPlan.
This is an efficiency program that matched the hours with local demand in the nation’s smallest Post Offices, in order to avoid closure.
This is a strategy that could keep the nation’s smallest Post Offices open for business, while providing a framework to achieve significant cost savings as part of the plan to return the organization to financial stability.
The plan would keep the existing Post Office in place, but with modified retail window hours to match customer use. Access to the retail lobby and to P.O. Boxes would remain unchanged, and the town’s ZIP Code and community identity would be retained.
The strategy has been implemented over a two year period. Once implementation is completed, the Postal Service estimates savings of a half billion dollars annually.
“Meeting the needs of postal customers is, and will always be, a top priority. We continue to balance that by better aligning service options with customer demand and reducing the cost to serve,” Postmaster General and CEO Patrick R. Donahoe said when the announcement was made in 2012.
“With that said, we’ve listened to our customers in rural America and we’ve heard them loud and clear – they want to keep their Post Office open. We believe the announcement will serve our customers’ needs and allow us to achieve real savings to help the Postal Service return to long-term financial stability.”