A brilliant business model adopted by the USPS ... accept revenue while refusing service!

This is the fourth post in a series that will factually outline the fraudulent actions of the USPS and the crimes committed by employees of SG Print & Mail in response to those actions.  At the end of the day some individuals would be sentenced to prison terms and some would parlay their lies into deals with the government.  Some would take responsibility for their actions while others would not. The most culpable party as many would attest, the United States Postal Service, would not be required to answer to any of their actions. 

My company, SG Print & Mail, began a relationship with the USPS in 2002.  We earned the respect, confidence and loyalty of most of Maytag's appliance dealers within a short period of time and would provide direct mail services to them.  One of our great obstacles early on was trying to overcome the fears of these customers, most of which had been burned by the USPS in the past.  Many had come to know and fear that the return on their large advertising investment was directly attributable to the ability of the USPS to timely deliver their mail ... never a given.  

Our frustrations with the USPS would begin soon after our relationship started.  Our attempts to use priority mail to ship our customers mail from our plant to their local post office (DDU) was an absolute disaster.  Priority mail provided NO reliable tracking mechanism.  It quickly became obvious that the USPS was not capable of moving mail effectively or reliably from point A to point B.  We would have to find another shipping option that would exclude the USPS as much as possible.  We chose United Parcel Service (UPS) and would soon be confronted with a new problem ... the USPS did not like to see those big brown trucks pulling up to their offices.

Matter of fact, they disliked them so much they would often REFUSE to accept our UPS deliveries ... deliveries of our clients mail.

This occurred in the early years almost on an  daily basis.  The USPS would accept payments for mail then refuse to provide the service we had paid for.  I have to admit it's a hell of a business model if you can get away with it.

In the private sector there are remedies for this type of fraudulent behavior.  Unfortunately, in the world this quasi government agency exists they have a license to steal. The Federal Tort Claims Act even exempts the USPS from claims against the United States Postal Service out of the loss, miscarriage or negligent transmission of letter or postal matter;

What then to do .....

I had gone well up the postal food chain in an effort to resolve these issues.  The Gateway District, of which we belonged, ignored me or more typically passed me on to someone else to ignore my concerns.  Despite our constant requests and our obvious eligibility the Gateway District would never even provide us a postal representative to assist us with these matters.

A bigger and more immediate problem was how to overcome the enormous losses we were saddled with. 

Do I just pass my financial losses on to my customers as the USPS did with us?  Do I try to explain to my customers that despite everyones best effort (except the USPS) to provide the service they paid for their mail was sitting back at my plant and there was nothing I could do about it?  Do I explain to them that these things just happen from time to time and maybe they'll get luckier next time with their attempts to send direct mail?  Do I tell them that I provided the service they paid me for and that I cannot take responsibility for the actions of the USPS?  The obvious answer to all of these questions was NO ... SG Print & Mail would take responsibility when the USPS would not.

Festus Postmaster Tries to Assist

From the period 2002 until 2008 when we consolidated our plants and moved to Leadington, the Festus Post Office had eight different Postmasters or Officers in Charge (OICs).  The first of those Postmasters recognized the devastating financial affects that our company was now incurring.  He offered to us a very slight remedy.  He would allow us Free mail within our community ... the mail he could control.   Although a nice gesture, we rarely did mail within our community.  His efforts did little to overcome our losses.   

Losses continue ... SG employee suggests remedy

As SG continued to grow exponentially, most of our profits were being used to satisy our clients losses.  We would typically not refund clients for a job but would "redo" jobs for them ... jobs that were affected by USPS non performance.  Sometime in 2004, I believe, SG's Maytag customer service rep came to me with an idea to offset our losses.  The rep, Bill Menkhus, would attribute this idea to a Festus Postmaster or OIC.  The idea, or what the government would later characterize as a scheme, would be to take credit on postal forms for stamps which were not being used.  At that time I was not particularly involved with the completion of the postal forms as Bill was.  I would occasionally sign the forms after their completion and it was a common practice for other employees to sign my name to these forms.

My first reaction to this suggestion was that it probably did not come with USPS endorsement.  Bill, with his knowledge of the forms, had probably just created the idea himself.  On the other hand, the USPS had assisted us in the past occasionally with offsetting our losses.  I'm sure they knew our losses were threatening our very existence.  I fully endorsed the idea even with the knowledge that Menkhus had probably created it.  By then it was almost a necessity anyway if we were going to continue taking the financial responsibility for the USPS' actions.

USPS takes lid off cookie jar ....

The other thing I took into consideration was that the USPS was refusing to verify our mail.  This is akin to a bank opening its doors and directing its customers to help themselves to the teller drawers.  It is the responsibility of the USPS to provide for the proper verification of standard mail.  From 2002 until mid 2007, the USPS NOT EVEN ONCE provided for the proper verification of our mail.   The USPS had effectively placed us on the honor system.  USPS employees were signing anything we presented to them with total disregard to its accuracy.  

The Gateway District and of course the Festus office had fostered a culture in which no concern was given to anything.  They were clearly "stealing" from my clients and turning their backs as we "balanced the ledger."  Our actions were necessitated by their actions. Our actions would later be considered crimes and their actions would later be considered as a lack of competence. 

In later posts I will detail the second and third schemes (I really find that characterization amusing) that I would plead guilty to being a part of.  I will also share how the USPS, once they finally started verifying the mail, would intentionally manipulate forms to create additional revenue for themselves.  These actions of the USPS would be the basis for our argument of the amount of the financial impact as claimed by the USPS.  You will later learn that the actions of the USPS would never be considered relevant.  Again, the USPS had a license to steal and were backed in full by the US Attorney's office.

The USPS, as a result of their refusal of services, would be paid for approximately NINETEEN MILLION pieces of mail that they would NEVER deliver.