Business and Marketing

A group of direct mail stakeholders submitted a document to the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) today stating its opposition to the U.S. Postal Service's motion to have a court stay its first scheduled report on the effects of exigency.

In its December decision approving the 4.3% exigent rate hike, the PRC qualified that the increase should stay in effect only until losses the Postal Service suffered due to the Great Recession were recovered, a period it estimated at about two years. In that regard, it required USPS to report incremental revenue generated by the special increase 30 days after each quarter. The first report is due on Wednesday. A further proposal for the eventual removal of the exigent increase is due from USPS on Thursday.

Noting that the Postal Service's motion to the U.S. Court of Appeals in D.C. does not satisfy any of four criteria for such a stay set down by settled law, the mailers' group further took issue with the timing of the request.

“The Postal Service was on notice four months ago that the compliance reports at issue would be due on April 30 and May 1,” reads the mailers' submission. “The Postal Service knew from the outset the nature of the purported data limitations that it now asserts as a purported justification for its motion. Yet the Postal Service chose to withhold its stay motion until one week before the filing deadlines—too late for the Commission to give reasoned consideration to the motion.”

The opposition letter was filed by a coalition of 16 private companies and industry associations including The American Catalog Mailers Association, the Association of Marketing Service Providers, the Direct Marketing Association, RR Donnelley, and Valpak.

“The Commission is charged with regulating the Postal Service, and the Postal Service must understand that it cannot pick and choose which of the Commission's orders it will comply with,” continued the doctument. “The Commission should take this opportunity to reassert its regulatory authority.”

Business Breaking News: Why Mobile Shoppers Might Not Be So Good For Your Business

Are smartphones undermining your business? While mobile devices are often heralded as a retailer's best friend because they facilitate easier payments and provide more platforms on which to sell, a new poll of U.S. consumers reveals that these pocket-sized tools could also be a retailer's worst enemy.

The poll by Thrive Analytics and the Local Search Association found that a majority of U.S. smartphone owners use their phones, at least sometimes, to compare prices while shopping at brick-and-mortar stores. And as eMarketer reports, these tech-savvy shoppers don't feel guilty about forgoing an in-store purchase for a digital one if they find a better price online.

While the poll found that young smartphone users (ages 18-29) were the most likely to use their phones inside stores (97 percent of them said they had done so), 91 percent of consumers ages 30 to 43 also said they use their phone while shopping. The report additionally found that 81 percent of young baby boomers (ages 44 to 53) take to their mobile devices in-store, and 69 percent of the oldest consumers surveyed, those ages 54 and up, said they use their smartphones while shopping at brick-and-mortars.

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