Postal People

Postal PEOPLE

USPS Migrating All Personnel Info to PostalPEOPLE System (7/17/06)

PostalPEOPLE replaces a system that consisted of over 3,800 Postal Service HR professionals relying on more than 200 processes and some 70 systems to support nearly 700,000 employees and facilitate millions of personnel transactions each year. Many of these old systems were at maximum capacity.

“PostalPEOPLE is helping to increase efficiency, reduce costs and provide employees with individualized attention and access to their personnel files and other HR-related information 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” said Anthony Vegliante, Chief Human Resources Officer and Executive Vice President for the Postal Service.

One of the main benefits of PostalPEOPLE is that it allows employees to perform routine HR tasks when it is most convenient for them – either at personnel kiosks located at postal facilities around the country, or away from the workplace through a new online system with a personal computer at home, local library, or internet café. Employees can also call an interactive voice recognition (IVR) system from any location. This 24/7 availability is important because many postal employees work non-traditional hours and don’t have the opportunity to address HR issues from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The Postal Service is in the process of migrating all of its personnel information to PostalPEOPLE. By the end of this August, all employees will be able to use PostalPEOPLE to perform benefit and compensation, retirement, and administrative and executive job vacancy functions. Full deployment of all systems is expected to be complete by next year. (source: USPS)

Postal PEOPLE - New HR initiative underway
posted Feb. 24,, 2005 (source: USPS)
Human Resources is changing in a big way. More than 3,800 HR professionals are using outdated systems that are paper driven, time intensive and create a significant manual workload — but not for long. Thanks to a new initiative — PostalPEOPLE — USPS is streamlining, standardizing and automating the way HR works.

Personnel Services is moving to a single HR Shared Services Center (HRSSC) in Greensboro, NC, featuring employee self-service and internet access. This means “one-stop shopping” for all employees to manage and conduct their personnel transactions.

The Northland, Santa Ana and Triboro Performance Clusters are the first sites to move personnel processes to the HRSSC. In fact, Northland PC has already moved its EAS vacancy recruitment and selection process to Greensboro. Santa Ana and Triboro will follow shortly.

Plans call for moving the remaining 77 PCs to the new HRSSC environment on a staggered schedule starting in January 2006 and finishing in 2007.

PostalPEOPLE will give employees 24-7 access to HR info

May 24, 2004

The Board of Governors recently approved funding for PostalPEOPLE, which will allow employees to perform routine HR transactions 24-7 in a self-service environment by giving them access to their personnel files and other HR-related information. An HR Shared Services Center will provide employees with individual attention using interactive voice response, an HR knowledge base and agent assistance.

The new system will offer employees more convenient, accurate and faster services by streamlining and automating administrative and transactional functions. The goal is to improve employee satisfaction and help USPS more effectively manage our resources and costs.

PostalReporter.com Reader- PostalPEOPLE will be launched beginning in January 2006, and continuing through early 2007.

June 20, 2003

Kiosks give employees walk-up access to HR self-service applications

WASHINGTON — Need to add a new emergency contact? Want to change your Thrift Savings Plan? But you don't have access to the postal intranet? No sweat. USPS employees now can stay "in touch" with Human Resources (HR) at self-service kiosks being placed in postal facilities nationwide.

Staged deployment of 310 personnel central kiosks begins soon to plants and large bulk mail centers. The kiosks give employees round-the-clock access to HR self-service applications such as PostalEASE, employee training history, change of address and emergency contact information. In addition, the kiosks will offer employee access to job bidding.

The kiosks are a joint effort of HR and Information Technology. They're a fast, convenient and secure way to conduct routine personnel matters. Kiosks will be placed in locations accessible to employees, such as swing rooms, cafeterias, near employee entrances and in existing bidding areas.

Employees will be able to use the kiosks after hours when HR offices are closed — an important feature for employees on tours one and three.

Five pilot sites — Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Phoenix and Tampa — have tested the kiosks since July 2002. Employees use their SSN/PIN combination to access the self-service applications. There are privacy safeguards to protect employee information as well as physical security for the computer components.

Most importantly, employees are making their own changes, taking care of routine transactions themselves, helping the Postal Service to improve efficiency while increasing HR access for its employees. (source: USPS)

Additional Info: The Postal Service is installing more than 300 computer kiosks to give employees online access to human resources applications. The Personnel Central Kiosk initiative expands on the earlier PostalEase program for benefits changes via intranet and interactive voice response. Kiosk Information Systems initially will produce and support 310 kiosks under a $4.1 million contract, and USPS has an option for another 300. The installation isn’t large, Snyder said, but it is being done in a hurryBy early September, more than 200 were online, Wiles said. They went first to the 197 processing facilities and bulk mail centers with the most employees. Most large sites will have two kiosks. The first 310 will serve 350,000 to 400,000 employees.

(source: USPS News Link)

posted July 4, 2004

History of a 204-b

Ever wonder why acting supervisors are called 204-bs? We did, so we did a little research.

In the past it was thought that “204b” was the number of the original form completed to put someone in an acting supervisor position many years go, when the U.S. Postal Service was known as the Post Office Department.

Wrong.

USPS Historian Megaera Ausman found the answer, citing this pertinent section 204.(b) from Public Law 68-June 10, 1955, titled Dual Employment and Extra Duties:

“Sec. 204.(b) As the needs of the service require, an employee may be assigned from time to time to perform, without change in compensation, duties and responsibilities other than the duties and responsibilities specifically set forth in his position description; however, if any employee is assigned for more than thirty days in any calendar year to duties and responsibilities of a salary level which is higher than the salary level to which his position is assigned, except to perform service in a relief capacity for a supervisor granted compensatory time pursuant to section 603, he shall be paid for the period of his assignment in excess of thirty days a basic salary computed in accordance with provisions of section 502.”

And that’s the name of that tune.

Special thanks to Rosa Flores from the National Association of Postal Supervisors for her assistance.

source: USPS

8 cents Postal Service Employees April 30, 1973 stamps. Postal People includes Postmasters, Supervisors, Letter Carriers, Clerks, Mail Handlers, Rural Letter Carriers, Maintenance and Special Delivery Messengers

From the mailbag: Each employee on the roles 5/30/73 received a poster of the 10 stamps with a note from then postmaster general E T Klassen (Postmaster General - 1971-1975) plus a 1st day's of issue envelope with all ten stamps on it. It seemed like a big deal then! I still have mine (posted 10/27/02)