Jobs for thousands of letter and package delivery workers at the U.S. Postal Service and UPS could be cut this year, with both looking to slash costs and streamline operations as the effects of President Trump’s tariffs and digital innovation ripple through the economy.
But what that means for people with a package to ship or eagerly waiting for an important bill or letter may depend on where they live.
Here’s what we know so far:
How many jobs are being cut?
Last week, the chief executive of the United Parcel Service announced that the company will cut 20,000 jobs this year, or about 4% of its global workforce and plans to close 73 distribution facilities by the end of June.
“We are executing the largest network reconfiguration in UPS history,” the company said in a statement. “This strategic initiative will optimize the capacity of our network to align with expected volume levels and enhance productivity through additional automation.”
The closures are part of a long-term plan to modernize the operations of its distribution centers, including adding automation, either fully or in part, to 400 of its facilities, according to CNN. Earlier this year, UPS announced that it reached a deal with Amazon, its largest customer, to reduce business-related operations by more than 50% by the second half of 2026.
“Further, the actions we are taking to reconfigure our network and reduce cost across our business could not be timelier,” UPS Chief Executive Carol Tomésaid during a recent conference call. “The macro environment may be uncertain, but with our actions, we will emerge as an even stronger, more nimble UPS.”
For its part, the Teamsters union that represents thousands of UPS workers said it would fight any cuts that harm its members.
“The United Parcel Service is contractually obligated to create 30,000 Teamsters jobs under our current national master agreement,” Sean M. O’Brien, president of Teamsters General, said in a statement.
“If UPS wants to continue to downsize corporate management, the Teamsters won’t stand in its way,” he said. “But if the company intends to violate our contract or makes any attempt to go after hard-fought, good-paying Teamsters jobs, UPS will be in for a hell of a fight.”
In March, then-Postmaster General Louis DeJoy announced the U.S. Postal Service would be cutting 10,000 positions as well as slashing the Postal Service’s budget with the help of Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, according to a letter sent to members of Congress. Musk’s group is not a government agency.
The move comes as the Postal Service has experienced close to $100 billion in losses and was projected to lose an additional $200 billion, DeJoy stated in his letter.
USPS employs 533,724 people as of 2024.
The Postal Service has been working toward modernizing its operational efficiency, service reliability and financial stability with its Delivering for America plan, introduced in 2021.
The 10-year plan was updated last year to revisit initial goals, highlight changes and lay out plans for future initiatives. Within the updated report, the Postal Service stated that the number of mail collected through its post offices and by carriers on their routes has sharply declined over the last decade.
The number of collected letters and postcards dropped from 57 billion pieces in 1997 to just 12 billion pieces in 2023, an 80% reduction.
Now, the Postal Service is reconfiguring its collection and transportation processes to address that decline. Mail is currently transported to and from processing facilities and post offices twice a day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. Those deliveries will be cut to a single daily trip in the morning, according to the report.
“This will optimize our regional transportation, cut unnecessary routes and expedite processing,” the report stated.
How will this affect estimated delivery time?
Despite cutting 20,000 positions and automating work at 400 facilities, UPS says the changes to its operations will not impact the experience of customers.
But for the U.S. Postal Service, some changes should be expected.
These changes will be implemented in two phases, the first phase began April 1 and the second will begin July 1.
Delivery times for first-class mail, which includes letters and postcards, will remain between one and five days.
The delivery time for priority mail express, a service that allows customers to ship packages up to 70 pounds to any state, will now take between one and three days. Previously, it was between one and two days depending on how late the day the item was dropped off.
Delivery of end-to-end marketing mail, what most people call junk mail, along with magazines and newspapers, will be delivered faster, but USPS did not provide specifics.
“As with mail, most competitive shipping products will retain the same service standard, some packages will have a faster standard, and some will have a slightly slower standard,” the report stated.
You can learn more about how long you can expect a package to arrive to its destination by visiting your local post office or checking the “Service Commitments” tool online. The tool asks for the exact ZIP Code of where the package will be sent from and mailed to, on which date and what time; it generates the average expected delivery time based on that information.
