From: Charlie Cash <CCash@apwu.org>
Subject: eOPF

Please share with the field ASAP.

As I shared before the Postal Service is in the process of addressing any insecurities in their eOPF system. Cybersecurity best practices suggest personally identifiable information (PII) should not be shared on an open internet connection.

Many Official Personnel Files (OPFs) have PII such as social security numbers still in them. Many employees—including myself—have documents that are hand written and have our PII in them. The Postal service is currently “scrubbing” files of this PII. However, because of the older handwritten documents, this process will take up to six months. In the meantime, eOPF will be inaccessible. The APWU does not disagree that these files with PII should be scrubbed and made safe to transfer over the internet.

However, the APWU also demanded that OPFs be made available somehow and without charge. The Postal Service has established a process to do that now.

From the Postal Service:

Employees may request a copy of their eOPFs in person or in writing to their district Human Resource Office. If the request is made in writing, they will be requested to provide proof of identity.

No charges will be assessed of active employees for requested copies of hard copies of their eOPFs while the eOPF system remains unavailable due to security upgrades.

I have attached a list of District Human Resource contacts provided by the Postal Service for employees to use. This is how the Postal Service provided the list so I assume it is perfectly fine to share publicly.

It should also be noted that every employee still receives their PS-Form 50s via US Mail. All employees should be advised to open all mail received from the Postal Service and it is a good practice to archive any mailings or PS-Form 50s sent to them. As this problem with eOPF has proven, keeping your own files at home with these documents is worthwhile.

If any employees has problems getting their OPF after following this process, please file local grievances and inform my office through my assistant Lee Branca via email at lbranca@apwu.org.

Thank-you,
Charlie Cash
Industrial Relations Director
American Postal Workers Union, AFL-CIO
202-842-4273

District Human Resource contacts provided by USPS