Overview
Package Services includes Media Mail®/Library Mail, Bound
Printed Matter Flats, and Bound Printed Matter Parcels. Package Services
includes both single-piece and presort volumes, with approximately 83 percent
of the total represented by presort.
Service performance for Media Mail®/Library Mail and Bound
Printed Matter Parcels is measured using an internal USPS® system, the Product
Tracking System (PTS). This system
measures transit time from the time of mailing until the time of delivery to
the intended recipient, on parcels for which a customer requested Delivery Confirmation™
service. The first en route scan serves as the proxy for the time of mailing
for commercial and PC postage parcels that were not mailed over the counter.
Transit time is compared to USPS® service standards to develop the measure of
on-time service performance. The system measures service to and from virtually
all 3-Digit ZIP Code™ areas for which Package Services volume originates or
destinates.
Service performance for Bound Printed Matter Flats is
measured using documented arrival time at a designated postal facility to start
the measurement clock, and an Intelligent Mail® barcode (IMb™) scan by an
external, third-party reporter to stop-the-clock. Mail piece tracking from IMb™
in-process scans is used in conjunction with the external data to extrapolate
results to this entire volume of Full Service Intelligent Mail® Bound Printed
Matter Flats mail. Data collected by the Postal Service® are provided to an
independent, external contractor to calculate service measurement and compile
the necessary reports. The system used for this reporting is called the Intelligent
Mail® Accuracy and Performance System (iMAPS).
The external contractor determines service performance based
on the elapsed time between the start-the-clock event recorded by the Postal Service®
and the stop-the-clock event recorded by anonymous households and small
businesses that report delivery information directly to the contractor. The
service measure consists of two parts: (1) how long mail pieces take to get
through processing, and (2) how long mail takes from the last processing scan
to delivery. The second portion is used as a delivery factor differential to
determine the percent of all Bound Printed Matter Flats mail that is delivered
on the last processing date versus the percent delivered after the last
processing date. Service performance is measured by comparing the transit time
to USPS® service standards to determine the percent of mail delivered on time.
The Service Performance Measurement (SPM) application of the
Full Service Seamless Acceptance and Service Performance system (SASP) serves
as the data source for iMAPS. SPM captures data from all Full Service
Intelligent Mail® and applies business rules for service measurement before
sending data to iMAPS.
On January 27, 2013, Single-Piece Parcel Post® became a competitive
product. Therefore, Single-Piece Parcel Post® is no longer included in
measurement as of FY13 Quarter 3.
Limitations
In FY13 Quarter 4, Bound Printed Matter Flats data through
iMAPS were limited to mailers passing service performance business rules.
Data for the delivery factor of Bound Printed Matter Flats
were comprised of Bound Printed Matter Flats and Standard Mail® flats with
Intelligent Mail® barcodes received by external reporters. Standard Mail® flats
were used to supplement the very limited Bound Printed Matter Flats data
available during this period. Because even the combination of those two types
of mail still resulted in too little volume, EXFC flats were also used to
supplement the data for calculating the delivery factor. As a result of the use
of this proxy data, which may differ significantly from the actual product, the
delivery factor may not be representative of the gap between estimated delivery
based on the final automated processing and actual delivery for Bound Printed
Matter Flats to every district.
In FY13 Quarter 4, the service performance results for
Package Services through PTS included the data available for retail parcels
mailed end-to-end from over the counter and with Delivery Confirmation™ and
End-To-End commercial and PC postage parcels with Delivery Confirmation™. The
first en route scan was used as the start-the-clock for the performance
measurement of End-To-End parcels that were not mailed over the counter, with
no adjustments for any transit time between acceptance and the first en route
scan. USPS® is in the process of developing an approach to account for the
period from when the Postal Service® receives the mail until the first en route
scan of the mail. Results for Destination Entry Bound Printed Matter parcels
were also included in the measurement. However the results may not be
representative of all parcels because of the heavy volume of DDU-entry parcels
in measurement compared with the overall population.
Due to the limitations of the current systems, the overall
Package Services results are presented without any weighting. That is, no
attempt was made to use the measured pieces to represent the entire Package
Services population. These results represent the service performance for all
measured Package Services pieces during the quarter.
Performance Highlights
National Package Services performance was 88.0 percent on
time, with 98.9 percent delivered within the service standard plus three days
in FY13 Quarter 4.
The Baltimore Performance Cluster had the highest service
performance, with 94.1 percent on time, followed by New York at 94.0 and Capital at 93.7 percent
on time. Capital Metro Area achieved the highest performance of the seven areas
with an on-time score of 92.4, exceeding the FY13 target of 91.0.
Annual performance has shown improvement over the last few
years, ending FY13 with 87.5 percent. Additionally, the percentage of packages
arriving within one, two, and three days of the service standard increased from
FY12. By three days after the service standard, 98.5 percent of package mail
arrived to its destination, an improvement over previous years.
