Passenger Airlines Get Deal To Haul The Mail

The US Postal Service awarded carry contracts to seven domestic passenger airlines.

Starting Saturday, September 30th, neither rain nor snow nor gloom of night will deter American Airlines, American Trans Air, Continental Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Midwest Airlines, Sun Country Airlines and US Airways from delivering your mail.  Well, that's what they hope anyway...

In a release, USPS Network Operations Vice President Tony Pajunas said, "By achieving consistent, on-time delivery for our customers, the performance standards implemented three years ago have helped us improve customer service overall. The new agreements ensure that -- together with the airlines -- we will continue to provide the highest levels of service."

The contracts stipulate on-time delivery requirements established in the 2003 internal overhaul Pajunas mentioned in his statement.

Also included in the deal is a requirement to allow the USPS to track customer's mail during transit -- much like commercial carrier rivals UPS and FedEx. Airlines will scan for three data points: when they receive it or it's loaded on a plane, during a transfer to a connecting flight and when the USPS accepts it at the destination.

The USPS estimates the seven carriers will share 450 million pounds of Express, First-Class and Priority mail between them in 2007. That translates to some $225 million. Carriers are to be paid based on the volume they carry.

Although the USPS is an agency of the US government, it doesn't use any taxpayer dollars for to pay for operations -- all revenue is derived from postage and product sales.

The USPS estimates its annual revenue at $70 billion.

FMI: www.usps.gov