By Chantel Rhodes
All the U.S. Postal Service wants for Christmas is the return of its white postal tubs.
'With Christmas coming, we need them to move mail,' Postal Service spokesman Robert Vunder said.
In the past two years, the Postal Service has purchased 20 million of these plastic tubs, used primarily for moving flat mail within post offices nationwide, according to a recent news release. The current supply has dwindled to less than 20,000.
With a $1.68 billion deficit reported for 2001 and a projected deficit for 2002, the Postal Service needs to reduce expenses any way it can.
That''s the reason representatives are asking postal customers to return the white plastic postal tubs, labeled 'U.S. Postal Service.'
'Return the tubs to your nearest post office, leave them at your mailbox or contact the post office for a pickup,' said Salt Lake City District Manager Stephen L. Johnson, in the release.
At $3.25 apiece, the Postal Service has lost $64.9 million in disappearing tubs.
Salt Lake City is the center of one of the Postal Service''s 85 districts. Vunder says it''s fair to estimate that Utahans may be storing $764,000 in missing tubs.
Postal tubs may be found in the back seats of cars, in garages, company mail rooms, stacked away in forgotten corners and it''s anyone''s guess where else.
These tubs make carrying large quantities of mail to customers easier for mail carriers, but they are meant to be returned, Vunder said.
It''s okay if businesses or individuals use them for their outgoing mail, he said. But they should not be used for internal office mail or anything else. After all, they are Postal Service property.