SCARBOROUGH, Maine — On Monday, the U.S. Postal Service’s busiest delivery day, employees at the cavernous distribution center serving much of Maine don’t get to see the packages delivered to doorsteps or the smiles of the recipients.
Neither does Shawn Patton, manager of the plant, but he said his employees know the importance of all the packages as they slip onto a conveyer belt and out toward their destination.
“It’s almost like Santa’s workshop,” Patton said inside the U.S. Postal Service’s processing and distribution center in Scarborough. “These are the elves of the postal service.”
This year, that workshop is busier than past years during the crucial season for the federal mail system that has continued to face financial challenges, amassing about $54.5 billion in net losses since 2007, according to its latest financial statement.
Nationally, the postal service expected Monday to break its one-day record for total mail handled, with the number of packages delivered during the holiday season on track to increase by a higher than expected 15 percent.
That comes as first-class mail during the rest of the year failed to meet targets for its 2015 fiscal year, ending Sept. 30.
The Postal Service hasn’t revealed exact state-level or regional traffic totals for the holidays, but Patton said the number of packages handled locally is set for a similar increase, driven primarily by increases in online shopping.
John Budzynski, national consumer advocate for the USPS, said that trend cuts across most communities.
“We’ve seen double-digit increases in package volumes and in rural, suburban and urban areas as people take advantage of having packages shipped straight to the home,” he said.
The Postal Service expected to deliver about 600 million packages between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve, a 10 percent increase compared with last year. As of Monday morning, Budzynski said the latest projection puts that growth at closer to 15 percent.
And that’s likely the trend across the state, based on increased package volumes out of Scarborough and at the post office in Machias, where postmaster Pat Nelson was waiting on a steady stream of customers Monday afternoon.
Nelson said this year has been the busiest in recent memory, particularly for packages, but also for its more traditional lines of business.
“I have sold all my Christmas stamps, and I didn’t think that was possible,” she said. “We always have extra. I guess we’re back in the Christmas card business.”
Patton said letter volumes have been down in Scarborough compared with last year but remain higher during the holiday season than the rest of the year.
The Postal Service has dealt with the increased volume of packages and holiday mail, in general, by continuing to deliver mail Sunday, between Thanksgiving and Christmas Day, for the second year in a row.
“We’re averaging more than 5 million [packages] on those Sundays alone,” Budzynski said. “It’s a way to make sure that we stay fluid and it’s been a successful plan.”
Patton said the addition of Sunday delivery has helped smooth a bottleneck that letter carriers faced on Monday mornings during the holidays, when mail to be delivered was about double the normal volume. He added many more people are home to receive packages on Sundays, as well.
While Monday was the busiest day for deliveries, the postal service still has late delivery options that will keep operations churning through to the Christmas holiday.
Budzynski said packages sent priority mail express by Dec. 23 should arrive by Christmas Day. For all holiday shippers, he offered two tips: Make sure to adequately pad packages with packing peanuts or other cushioning material to prevent damage and place a second address label inside of the box, as deliveries can be delayed or diverted if there’s any damage to the outer label.
Customers can also sign up at usps.com for real-time notifications about their package’s travel.
Those late shipments will keep post offices including Nelson’s churning through holiday deliveries this week. Nelson said letter carriers out of Machias will keep working through Christmas Eve, which could mean delivering later than the office’s closing time of 2 p.m. Thursday.
In Scarborough, at the 500-employee distribution center, the season for overtime pay will continue through the holiday, with some employees working on Christmas Day in preparation for regular delivery Saturday.
“We’re tired, but we love it because we know this is our bread and butter,” Patton said.
BDN writer Johanna Billings contributed to this report.