The U.S. Postal Service has asked Congress for $2 billion in support and reimbursements, and its head has warned the agency will be forced to make significant cuts — starting with retail post offices — unless lawmakers act, Reuters reported. Postmaster General David Steiner made the warning on Tuesday, November 10, at a meeting of the Postal Board of Governors, the same day the Postal Service released its results for the fiscal year that ended September 30.
Source: Reuters
The $2 billion is what the Postal Service says Congress owes it for requirements lawmakers have imposed without funding them. Steiner laid out three choices for Congress, as Reuters described them: change the retirement-funding rules and other mandates that weigh on the agency, pay for those obligations, or accept a smaller Postal Service with reduced service. He said the agency could also be forced to slow mail delivery, and that fully developed contingency plans for the possible reductions would be ready by March.
Source: Reuters
The headline loss did improve. The Postal Service lost $6.5 billion in fiscal 2026, $2.5 billion less than the $9.0 billion it lost the year before, Reuters reported. Its controllable loss — the part that excludes mandated obligations outside management's control — fell by $344 million to $2.4 billion, from $2.7 billion a year earlier, according to FreightWaves' report on the results.
Source: FreightWaves
Operating revenue rose 3 percent to $82.9 billion, driven by expansion in Ground Advantage, the Postal Service's economy parcel product with two-to-five-day service standards, strength in marketing mail, temporary parcel transportation surcharges, and a First-Class mail price increase, FreightWaves reported. The improvement on the cost side came mainly from a fall in workers' compensation and retirement expenses, which outweighed increases elsewhere, including a $225 million rise in transportation expenses.
Source: FreightWaves
"Our actions alone cannot resolve" an outdated model
Chief Financial Officer Luke Grossman said in a statement: "Our actions alone cannot resolve the challenges brought on by an outdated business model. We will continue to do our part but we need meaningful legislative, regulatory, and administrative reforms to propel the Postal Service toward long-term financial sustainability," FreightWaves reported. Board member Daniel Tangherlini, who was elected chairman during the same meeting, pointed to how closely the agency hit its cost goals over the past six months despite fuel and inflation headwinds.
Source: FreightWaves
The cost-cutting already under way is substantial. The Postal Service cut 19 million work hours in fiscal 2026 and continued consolidating its processing and transportation networks, according to reporting on the results. It deferred about $2.6 billion in federal retirement contributions during the year — payments it will eventually have to make — and Steiner said earlier this year that the agency is balancing daily operations against the need to conserve cash. A permanent fuel surcharge for package shipments is set to begin in January, a cost that will land directly on businesses that ship parcels.
Source: Supply Chain 24/7
What the Postal Service is asking Congress to change
Beyond the $2 billion, the agency's long-standing asks include removing uneconomical mandates such as six-day-a-week delivery, and raising its $15 billion borrowing limit, which has been in place since 1992. The Postal Service has previously said it could be insolvent by 2031, when its retiree health benefit fund is exhausted; in June, Steiner told lawmakers that revised projections put a potential cash shortfall between 2031 and 2034. The new Democratic-led Congress, which takes office in January, will decide whether to help, Reuters reported, after Republicans held a series of hearings over the last two years on the agency's finances.
Source: Reuters
The Postal Service is the one delivery network that reaches every address in the country, including the rural routes and small towns where private carriers charge more or do not go. For Punjabi diaspora families and small businesses in the United States — e-commerce sellers, importers, truckers in the postal transport chain, and families mailing documents and parcels to India — slower delivery, fewer retail post offices and a January parcel fuel surcharge are not abstract budget items. They are the March contingency plans Steiner has promised, and the January Congress that will decide whether they are needed.
Steiner, who took over the agency in July 2025, has made raising revenue a top priority and told Congress earlier this year that the business model is broken, according to the reports. That framing is now the agency's central argument: its own measures — more parcel revenue, fewer work hours, network consolidation — narrowed the loss by $2.5 billion in a year, but management says the remaining gap is created by rules only Congress can change.
Source: FreightWaves
What happens next: Steiner's fully developed contingency plans for cuts are due by March; the new Congress takes office in January and will take up the $2 billion request and the wider reform asks; and the January parcel fuel surcharge takes effect regardless. No decision on the $2 billion had been announced in the reports available at the time of publication.