Postal Service’s delays continue as Nov. 3 nears

Less than two weeks before the election, delays continue to plague the U.S. mail, a tracking effort by the USA TODAY Network and the University of Maryland’s Howard Center for Investigative Journalism found.

Of 64 letters and packages sent short distances within battleground states since mid-September, 14 took longer than the U.S. Postal Service’s own three-day service standard for first-class local mail. Most of the problems arose in Michigan, although Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida each had at least one late arrival.

Eight of the shipments took a week or more to get to their cross-town destinations, including one letter that still has not arrived, according to the post office’s online tracking system. The missing letter was put in the mail on Oct. 6.

Although the mailings were too small in number to determine if widespread delays are occurring, the erratic results make it hard to know whether or not your ballot will arrive at the elections office by the legal deadline.

Millions of people are likely to vote by mail this year because of the coronavirus pandemic, and most are registered Democrats.

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said her office has spent all year preparing for contingency plans, including a slowdown in mail. The office installed more than 1,000 drop boxes across the state and set up 21 satellite offices for election needs in Detroit alone.

That massive intake apparatus “enables us to, today, two weeks out, recommend that people not use the mail,” she said.

Responding to USA TODAY’s findings, Benson said the delays “will certainly have an impact on our residents. Sometimes people only get mail two days a week. The impact of the slowdown extends far beyond the election. That’s very real.”

At least some of the operational problems that arose after the appointment in May of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who instituted cost-cutting measures, have persisted into the fall. DeJoy ordered the dismantling and deactivation of mail sorting machines, barred overtime and required carriers and trucks to start routes at certain times, regardless of whether the mail was ready, resulting in widespread slowdowns.

Quarterly on-time reports produced by the Postal Service show that the Detroit area has had one of the highest rates of late mail in the country at 34%.

USA TODAY found how long the delay can be for letters that get misplaced or mishandled. Even if a tiny percentage of ballots were to get set back by a week or two, it could translate to thousands of discounted ballots.

Roundabout journeys

Certified mail carries a bar code and a tracking number that allow customers to check online each time and location where postal employees scan it into government computers and log its status.

In 38 of the letters mailed by the news network, reporters inserted GPS tracking devices in bubble-wrapped manila envelopes to paint a more detailed portrait of why delays occurred.

On Sept. 21, a reporter mailed a GPS unit from a post office in Bradenton, Florida, to a destination across town, 6 miles northeast.

GPS readings show the envelope went due north, 43 miles, to Tampa, where it stopped for the day.

From there, it traveled east, more than a third of the way across the state, to Lakeland.

Over the next five days, it went to Sebring, back to Lakeland, again to Tampa, then back to Bradenton. The package arrived at its destination on the Manatee River on Sept. 28.

The next week, the reporter sent the GPS unit from the same location, addressed to the same recipient.

It made that trip in one day.

Marti Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Postal Service, said the agency is committed to and capable of handling the expected surge in ballots as the coronavirus crisis leads more people to vote by mail. She said the agency will give extra attention to what it can tell is election mail. That attention will include expedited handling, extra deliveries and special pickups for mail identified as a ballot, she said. She suggested voters get their ballots in early.