USPS, Mail Handlers Union Come to Terms

The U.S. Postal Service and the National Postal Mail Handlers Union agreed to a tentative two-year contract extension on April 7. If ratified by union members, the contract will give 58,000 postal employees a 1.3% wage increase effective Nov. 27, 2004, and another 1.3% increase on Nov. 26, 2005.

Among other terms of the tentative contract, which expires Nov. 20, 2006, are the continuance of employees’ cost of living allowance and a venue for addressing employee repositioning. All other contract provisions would remain intact. The USPS signed a similar contract extension with its largest union, the American Postal Workers Union, in December 2002.