HERRIMAN, Utah -- A Postal Service employee claims a Utah Post Office is faking package deliveries and falling short on mail distribution, and they say it’s because of understaffing during the holidays.
It’s the thick of holiday season deliveries, as postal workers rushed from house to house in Herriman on Friday carrying packages to doorsteps.
“We really are doing the best we can,” said a person who said they work at the Riverton Post Office.
But, they don’t always finish their deliveries, and the employee said what’s happening at that specific Post Office has become a problem.
“The entire Post Office is struggling this time of year, everybody struggles,” the person said, of the USPS in general. “But, the other stuff that goes on there—it's all a Herriman and Riverton issue.”
That ‘other stuff,’ the employee indicated includes purposely scanning packages as delivered when they’re not.
“They’re getting scanned as delivered, so that it looks like they’re delivered when their bosses downtown, or the regional bosses, or Amazon says, ‘Yes, this office is meeting their quota,’” the worker said.
According to the person, that’s why there’s a discrepancy between a package being marked as "delivered" when it actually hasn't been.
“It looks like it was delivered and they don’t have to hear from their boss saying, ‘Why didn’t you get 100 packages delivered today?’” the person explained.
Once scanned, the employee said they’ll deliver the boxes later—sometimes days later.
“There were still Amazon packages that were supposed to be delivered on Sunday, still going out Wednesday,” the person said.
On Wednesday, residents spoke to Fox 13 about the issues they noticed, including incorrectly scanned packages, late package deliveries, and missed mail deliveries.
“There are routes that don’t get delivered, the entire routes don’t get delivered in a day,” the person said. “So, yes: Your mail is being delayed.”
The reason for all of this, the worker said, comes down to staffing.
“It all goes back to management not scheduling and hiring enough people,” the employee said.
Understaffed, the person said, with a 400% package increase for the holidays and pressure to meet delivery demands all make for an aggravating situation for carriers.
“It is really frustrating to have to do this job, and not have the resources to get it done,” the worker said.
Fox 13 reached out to Amazon, which forwarded the media request to USPS. Fox 13 also reached out to USPS, and Public Relations Manager Dave Partenheimer said, "The reports you are hearing are not accurate."
Partenheimer sent a link to the news release below, which was a response to a similar news story with the same claims in Atlanta.
No merit to claims of misrepresenting delivery times in Atlanta
November 29, 2017
"The Postal Service takes allegations such as these very seriously. However, the information available to us indicates there is no merit to the claims raised in the article. The Postal Service is committed to upholding the highest ethical standards and vigorously protecting the security and sanctity of the mail. Should any issue arise that may compromise the high standards we hold ourselves to, employees are trained to immediately report issues up through their chain of command. They can do this anonymously, at any level in the management chain. To date, we have received no information that would substantiate the claims raised in the article.
"The Postal Service is proud to be the shipper of choice for both senders and receivers. No other shipper delivers as many e-commerce packages to the home."
Fox 13 previously reached out to the local Postal Service about the packages being scanned as delivered but not showing up for days, as well as other issues Herriman residents said they were experiencing within the Herriman area.
They sent this statement:
“We aim to provide timely and accurate delivery to each and every customer and apologize for any service inconvenience caused. If a customer has a service or delivery concern, we ask them to contact their Post Office, 1-800-ASK-USPS, or visit usps.com/help. We are currently addressing some sporadic delivery issues in the Herriman area which we hope to have resolved soon."
— Brian Sperry, USPS Corporate Communications
