Background

The U.S. Postal Service considers mail to be delayed when it is not processed in time to meet the established delivery day or when it is processed but not on the dock in time for scheduled transportation to delivery units. Delayed mail can adversely affect Postal Service customers and harm the organization’s brand.

The Postal Service launched the new Mail Condition Visualization (MCV) system in January 2019. The system provides near real-time visibility of a facility’s on-hand volume, delayed processing volume, delayed dispatch volume, and oldest mail date by mail category and processing operation; and stores historical trailer information. The MCV system calculates:

• Late arriving containers that arrived from another processing plant after the Critical Entry Time necessary to meet their delivery commitment for their class and shape.
• Delayed inventory by day by determining which mailpieces have not received their next expected processing operation scan by 6:59 a.m. for destinating final processing operations and by 6:00 a.m. for all other operations.
• Delayed dispatch to include containers that have not received final dock (departure) scan more than 15 minutes after Dispatch of Value and before 7:30 a.m. on the Management Operating Data System date following Dispatch of Value.

From January 1, 2020, through March 31, 2021, the Postal Service had over 13 million containers of delayed dispatch mail nationwide, as recorded in the MCV system. It also had over 2 million containers of late dispatch and 1.3 million containers of late arriving mail.

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Source: USPS Office of Inspector General