Post office’s workload ‘doubled’
Page 4 • Wednesday, September 10, 2014 • The Hammonton Gazette
POST OFFICE, from Page 1
tion of the two municipal postal services has
been an increase in mail deliveries.
“The work has doubled. With the growth
of the package industry, which is up around
16 percent throughout the country, we have
a lot more packages to deliver. Amazon is a
big package business for us now. We have a
lot of packages through Amazon. The workload has simply doubled. We have our carriers, vehicles to maintain and it’s quite an
adventure,” Scott said.
As expected with the consolidation, Scott
said the post office’s volume has increased
as there are more employees to take care of
and safety continues to be addressed. Despite the increased workload, Scott said the
employees have been able to adapt to the
change.
“I would say it is organized chaos. It
seems to be a team effort. Everybody is stepping up to the plate and helping each other
out. Everything has been in orderly fashion,
and we always strive to keep it that way. We
have another town coming in, it is just more
travel and carriers have to be familiarized
with the territory,” Scott said.
Scott explained what the consolidation
has meant from a route standpoint, as carriers have to deliver packages and mail to both
municipalities.
“Egg Harbor is just like a P.O. Box section
though, so there are no deliveries from that
building. We do all the deliveries here, rural
and city. There are three city routes and there
are eight rural routes,” Scott said.
Dwayne Holmes has been the
postmaster at the Marlton Post Office, but was recently transferred to
the Hammonton Post Office, and at
the moment, assigned the position
of officer in charge. Holmes said the
consolidation has been a cost-cutting measure, and it has helped prevent the inflation of the products.
“So far it has been successful. I
have only been here for a couple
weeks. It is a really nice office. Egg
Harbor is a great town, Hammonton
is a great town and people seem to
be receiving the change well. We
have not had any issues,” Holmes
said.
Steve Repko previously worked
as a carrier out of the Egg Harbor
City facility. Repko, who has been
a United States Postal Service employee for seven years, said one notable
difference
after
the
consolidation has been the travel
back-and-forth from Egg Harbor
City and Hammonton. He talked
about the advantages of working in
Hammonton now.
“I think it will allow us to provide
services that we wouldn’t be able to
provide in a smaller office. The experimental thing they are doing with
Amazon where you get a package
the same day, we wouldn’t be able
to do that in Egg Harbor City, but
we can do that here because of the
size of the office and distance,”
Repko said.
It has taken Repko time to adapt
to the consolidation, and he said he
is making progress. It might take
him a few additional months to fully
feel comfortable with the everyday
operations.
Hammontonian Stan Lawley has
been working at the Hammonton
Post Office for 20 years. Lawley
said the consolidation has been fine
and everyone is learning to adapt.
“I like working in Hammonton
because I was born and raised here.
I have gotten to know my customers
o