[img]583|left|Eric L. Wattree||no_popup[/img]I received a flood of emails and phone calls over the weekend, all from postal employees in the Los Angeles District, angrily reporting that the U.S. Postal Service has committed yet another assault on customer service.
The employees at Barrington Station in West Los Angeles reported that last Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, instead of extending its hours to accommodate customers unable to transact business the day before, the station abruptly closed its doors two hours early, leaving customers angrily knocking on the door trying to get in. It was reported that the same thing took place at Bicentennial Station.
Employees allege that the two incidents are one more example of the culture within the Los Angeles District that places saving money, for which management is rewarded with bonuses, above customer service.
It is not unusual for a post office to change business hours. But in the past the Postal Service would give its customers ample notice of the pending change to ensure that customers were not unduly inconvenienced. In this case, several sources complained, it was done with such thoughtless unprofessionalism that even the employees were caught off-guard.
And Then Came Shock
Some employees were shocked when management closed the doors. They ordered the window clerks off the line to help sort mail that should have been sorted the day before.
One employee commented:
“We were discussing the situation among ourselves, and nobody could believe that things have gone downhill so far, so fast. I've been working for the Postal Service for twenty-eight year. I've seen them do crazy thing. But I didn't think it would get to the point where they would just close the door in the customers' faces. Doing something like that used to be unthinkable. We used to give priority to customer service during riots, floods and earthquakes. Now they're thumbing their nose at the public just to pad their bonuses.
“There were customers outside banging on the doors. I know they were upset. I sure would be. It reminded me of how I feel when I'm in a long supermarket line, and then just as I get close to the counter, the cashier puts out a sign saying, 'Line Closed.' At least in a supermarket they'd open another line for the shoppers to go to. In this case, the Post Office just locked the doors. No consideration was given to the fact many probably took off from work to get to the Post Office on the day after a holiday.
“People used to take pride in working for the Post Office. I remember when I met new acquaintances I'd find a way to work the fact that I was a postal employee into our conversation. Now these managers are so incompetent, irresponsible, and make us look so bad, I'm embarrassed to admit where I work. A lot of the public think this stuff is our fault.”
This behavior is rampant in the Postal Service, so routine that many employees suspect it cannot be an accident.
Why Incompetence Prevails
One longtime clerk said:
“No one in a position of responsibility could possibly be so unprofessional and clueless through ignorance alone. I think they're purposely trying to sabotage the Postal Service to make it easier for them to privatize us. The craft employees are the only thing that's holding the Post Office together. Management seems to be doing everything they can on a daily basis to make that harder. It's like trying to do your job with a bunch of bad kids running all over the place and getting into everything. Eric, a person would have to actually come in and see it to understand what I'm saying. I know this is an overused phrase, but in this case it is really unbelievable. Management doesn't care about customer service. All they want to do is save money. When they get customer complaints, they want to write craft employees up, knowing that they caused the problem. This district's management has become a liability to the Post Office. I want you to write that.”
It defies logic how the people in upper management think they can promote the viability of the Postal Service by alienating the workforce and their customer base.
One would think when an organization is in the precarious position that the Postal Service finds itself, it would try to raise the morale of the people doing the work and provide better customer service, Business Management 101. The Postal Service is doing the opposite, harassing, intimidating, stealing from its employees, undercutting employee efforts to provide quality service by putting policies in place that give saving money priority over customer service.
The corporate culture in the Los Angeles District makes the problem more serious, nearly impossible to correct. Cronyism, the primary problem, has been rampant for so long that people with the least talent, good sense and integrity are at the top of the food chain. The most capable, dedicated and knowledgeable routinely are weeded out and kept at the bottom.
There are a number of reasons. The priority of saving money is likely to work against the more intelligent, dedicated employee while the system will cater to those of lesser intelligence. In turn, that will lead to incompetent managers promoting their incompetent cronies.
Since mid- and upper management is brimming with incompetence, competence and intelligence are frowned upon as threatening.
Failures of the Postal Service are held up by corporatists as an example of why public service should be privatized. Actually, the Postal Service is a prime example of why public service should never be relegated to the private sector.
The 40-year experiment of trying to run the service like a private business demonstrates that whenever you attach a profit motive to public service, the corruption and greed attendant to making a profit will overwhelm the primary purpose of providing service. Virtually without exception, the service will be so negligible it can drown in a bathtub.
Eric L. Wattree is a writer, poet, and musician, born in Los Angeles. A columnist for The Los Angeles Sentinel, The Black Star News, a staff writer for Veterans Today, he is a contributing writer to Your Black World, the Huffington Post, ePluribus Media and other online sites and publications. He also is the author of “A Message From the Hood.”
Mr. Wattree may be contacted at wattree.blogspot.com or Ewattree@Gmail.com
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