WASHINGTON — Political campaign mailings and an increase in holiday package deliveries helped boost Postal Service revenue at the end of 2014, even as the agency posted a $754 million loss in the final three months of the year.
Still, Postmaster General Megan Brennan said that despite continuing losses, the outlook is much brighter than it has been. The agency’s revenue rose 4.3 percent in the final quarter of the year
“Our employees delivered double-digit growth in packages this holiday season, which shows our growing ability to compete for and win new package delivery customers,” Brennan told a meeting of the Postal Service’s Board of Governors.
She said a top priority of the Postal Service is to replace its aging fleet of trucks, with many of them more than 20 years old. “That’s key for us today,” she said. “Given the age of the fleet, you can appreciate that this investment is long overdue,” she said. “It will be a multiyear effort,” she added.
Holiday shoppers and political mailings before November’s midterm elections helped the agency’s revenues, she said.
Losses are largely the result of a law Congress passed in 2006 to pre-fund the health care costs of its future retirees.
