US Postal Service Bracing For Christmas Crush

Traditionally the Monday before Christmas is the busiest day of the year for the United States Postal Service.

The steady line at the Northside Station Post Office on Hovley Lane in Palm Desert tells the story.

This wholel building is counting down to December 20 when postal officials figure 800 million letters, cards and packages will be processed that day. A 43 percent jump over the 560 million pieces that are handled on an average day.

In fact at this point, if you haven’t already put your gifts in the mail there’s really only two options to make sure your package gets to its destination before Christmas.

“What we’re telling our customers about right now is that you want to send everything Priority, that’s the two to three day service which is not quaranteed,” said Raymond Rodriguez, the Palm Desert Postmaster. “The guarantee service that we have is our Express Mail overnight.”

Rodriguez added, unless you ship overnight, next Monday is probably the cut-off to get your packages in the mail if you want to insure they reach their destination in time for Christmas.

In order to help alleviate the Monday crush, the Hovley Lane post office will be open this Sunday December 19 from 10 a.m. until 4:30 p.m.