USPS To Launch Nationwide Program To Track Revenue Performance Of Window Clerks

September 18, 2008 by postal
Filed under: postal, usps, window clerks 

From the National League of Postmasters: 

 Postal Service meeting on POVs and a pilot program that is slated to go nationwide soon – the SSA Revenue Goals System.

Postal Service representatives met yesterday with leaders of Napus and the League. While the stated purpose of the meeting was to discuss the liability of Postmasters and other postal employees while using their privately owned vehicles (POVs) to conduct postal business, part of the meeting was used to discuss a pilot program that will be pushed out to the field soon.

 

The discussion which centered around the use of POV was lively and touched upon the different scenarios in which Postmasters and others might be in the situation where the use of a POV may be possible and how employees would be covered by insurance in the event of an accident. Part of the discussion dealt with the differences in insurance from state to state and company to company. Though no agreement was reached in the meeting, through the healthy exchange of ideas, a couple of courses of action were decided upon. The League is optimistic that something good will come from this meeting regarding the use of POVs.

 

Postal Headquarters representatives briefed the Postmaster organizations on a pilot program that is slated to go nationwide soon. Called the SSA Revenue Goals System, the process will track the retail performance of Sales and Service Associates (SSAs) at offices on the POS system. The system will generate a daily report on the retail performance that will be made available to Postmasters and supervisors. In turn, Postmasters and supervisors will be able to share the information with the SSAs during morning huddles to let them know where they stand as far as helping their post office or station reach retail revenue goals. According to Postal Headquarters, the pilot has shown that the SSAs like the system as it engages them in the day-to-day operation of their offices. The APWU apparently has supported the efforts. The greatest concern to the Postmaster organizations was the additional workload to an often already overloaded Postmaster or supervisor. We were assured that the input was minimal, but the return should be large. Time will tell how effective the program will be.

 

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Comments

17 Comments on USPS To Launch Nationwide Program To Track Revenue Performance Of Window Clerks

  1. Dave on Fri, 19th Sep 2008 6:27 pm

    2. Just blame it on the peons . Nothing new – - – don’t turn your back to the APWU

  2. Gregg on Fri, 19th Sep 2008 7:35 pm

    3. This is exactly why I gave up 20 years in the clerk craft. The window clerk job is horrible now. There is no personalization. I was like a talking robot to each customer and that’s exactly what the USPS wants and that’s because in a few years, there won’t be any more window clerks, there will be an APC at each window and 1 clerk to help out all the customers. Wait until the next contract, and we will all see.

  3. WINDOWWONDER on Sat, 20th Sep 2008 1:10 pm

    4. Just look at the telecommunications industry.

  4. Mike on Sun, 21st Sep 2008 9:08 am

    5. SSA Revenue Goals is a much needed tool in my opinion. I’m a Carrier forced into the SSA/Window position, and I watch daily as my co-workers, leave the window for hours without any accountability in what else they are doing.

    They often times are just talking to co-workers, while they leave me alone on the window, with a line out the door, while the ignorant Supervisor turns a blind eye to it.

    With the SSA Revenue tracking you can see who is a SLACKER on or away from the window.

  5. Baddboyy on Mon, 22nd Sep 2008 5:48 pm

    6. if management and the union like it………..cant be good………..always screwed by both

  6. Anonymous on Tue, 23rd Sep 2008 7:47 pm

    7. If you’re a PTF, you don’t have a choice on the time you work the window…therefore, unless you’re the boss’ favorite, you get stuck with the worst window hours of the day and you couldn’t make you’re revenue goal if your life depended on it. The time of day needs to be figured in. If not, it’s discrimination to the fullest!!!!!!!!!!!!

  7. jana on Mon, 29th Sep 2008 7:59 pm

    8. is there any truth to the rumer that csrs employees who do go out onthe early out will be forced to switch to fers?

  8. JRH on Wed, 1st Oct 2008 1:53 pm

    9. I agree with Gregg. I’m a 30 year postal employee who was a window trainer for the first 12 years of my career. Now, I don’t know anything although I’ve been working retail in some way, shape, or form since I was 15. Our office is on POS and we have been getting the reports daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly for quite some time. To me, this not an appropriate measure of my worth and I’m seriously considering transferring to our short-staffed local SCF where my work is always appreciated.

  9. Anonymous on Sun, 5th Oct 2008 5:23 pm

    10. here we go again! first mystery shopper letters of warnings and now this!

  10. jea on Wed, 22nd Oct 2008 8:27 am

    11. Biggest complaint from customers nationwide: There are not enough window clerks avail during the busiest time of the day. All windows should be open. no need to wait on line for a 1/2 hour

  11. SSA in da U.P. of MI on Mon, 10th Nov 2008 6:49 pm

    12. This SSA doesn’t benefit from the imposition of sales standards as many many of my customers send books at book rate, without delivery confirmation. I encourage them to add services, but still they don’t go for it. So in case you don’t know what happens to my “score” it goes down. Plus, hitting five buttons on my POS just so I can ask the Postmaster to look up a forwarding issue (God forbid I should be able to take care of this myself) takes longer than turning around and asking him does. Plus, punching buttons to tell ‘POS’ I’m retrieving a package takes longer than picking up the actual package. The new system probably works in the city – but not necessarily in a small town where most of it’s citizens are layed off miners or just unemployed. And closing the window operation on Saturday in a town 25 miles from the nearest large town doesn’t go over big with those who do have jobs and can’t get in during regular hours. Whatever happened to putting the customer first?

  12. ready to retire on Wed, 12th Nov 2008 6:13 pm

    13. SSA Revenue Goals System for heaven’s sake. We will never be able to make up for all the waste of the BIG DOGS no matter how many extra services we sell. It’s never enough. All these ideas just keep coming in and the Postal Service is going out. Just make darn sure on your way out you don’t forget to SCAN ALL YOU CAN.

  13. anonymous on Tue, 25th Nov 2008 4:50 am

    14. now that THS has been doing all the work we used to do at the amc’s how cost effective has it been?You say you are paying then millions of $ even though they don’t have any mail to work.Lets take the attention away from that and bust on the window clerks.Plaese find some more things we can contract out!

  14. Former SSA on Thu, 4th Dec 2008 2:31 am

    15. SSA in da UP–Face it, the POS is the only way they can measure what you are doing. They’ve done away with real people standing behind you with a stopwatch and clipboard doing an actual Function 4 audit–Now it is just someone in an office somewhere looking at reams of data from the POS saying “Hmmmm, it doesn’t look like this clerk is doing very much based on POS data, so let’s eliminate one clerk or one POS unit or both, and the numbers will look much better. Every time you punch in those keys on the POS, you earn the time that they give you for your job. Whether it is calling a supervisor or retrieving Hold Mail. And don’t screw yourself by hitting Other Customer Services, Mail Pickup, Vacation/Hold Mail, End of Transaction. Instead, just before hitting End of Transaction, press Standby. Now, go get the mail. When you get back, you have to sign in (5 seconds), and now you hit End of Transaction. WHY? Because if you have carriers like I did, sometimes it takes a while to figure out where the he** they put the mail this time. All the while when you are doing that, the POS is collecting time data, saying “Hmm, it takes clerks a little longer than I thought to find and collect hold mail, I will have to keep track of that and add more time unit credits for that function the next time POS evaluates the data”. Sound crazy? It may be, but that is what we are working with when POS is the only data collector measuring your job. Earn the time credits for everything you do. Those buttons you punch are saving your job, giving accurate data for the million things you do during the day. Don’t give a machine the benefit or satisfaction of cutting your hours or clerk allotment. Use the non-revenue keys for all the functions they represent.

    Sorry about the rant, but I don’t want to see any SSA jobs lost or POS units pulled because of a machine collecting data.

  15. window clerk on Fri, 26th Dec 2008 4:46 pm

    16. another way for the postmaster to be on you about not making them look good

  16. joe on Wed, 21st Jan 2009 7:54 pm

    17. sounds like quotas to me

  17. DJW on Sun, 22nd Feb 2009 9:30 am

    18. I am a PTF. Have been for 13 years. Every time I am next in line the regular job gets abolished! Anyway, I’m the one who does all the back work for my office and I am still just a revenue number. The regular now wants me off of the window so she can meet her goal! Go Figure. She monitors what I do and goes behind everything to find mistakes to give to the postmaster. That in my eyes is stupid. When I am on the window I make sure I follow every rule and sell sell sell to reach my goal. She accuses me of trying to get the customers who look like they are going to spend money! That’s a gift she must think I have. Can’t we all just get along? That’s what goals have done for my office.