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WASHINGTON (AP) — Political campaign mailings and an increase in holiday package deliveries helped boost U.S. 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 in the past.
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 multi-year effort," she added.
Brennan spoke to the Postal Service Board of governors and later took questions in a conference call with reporters.
Holiday shoppers and political mailings ahead of November's midterm elections helped the agency's revenues, she said.
Losses in large part due to a law Congress passed in 2006 to prefund the health care costs of its future retirees — a requirement the agency has unsuccessfully fought to have Congress repeal.
She cited a 35 percent decline in the volume of first class mail in the last ten years as a reason for the closures and consolidation of many individual post offices around the country, closures which have generated some opposition among lawmakers.
"That's a prudent business decision," she said.
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