The Small Unit Delivery Sorter that recently arrived at the City of Appleton’s post office is being celebrated as something that will make life easier for all the agency’s workers.
“We had to rely on manual sorting,” Appleton postmaster Ryan Schultz told WeAreGreenBay.com. “The new Small Unit Delivery Sorter will reduce the physical toll on our workforce.”
Installed earlier this month as part of the office’s expansion project and upgrade plan, the Small Unit Delivery Sorter is expected to help modernize operations by processing thousands of packages per hour, or up to eight times faster than what is now done manually.
Overall, the plan is part of the government’s 10-year Delivering for America plan, which calls for a $40 billion investment to modernize operations, including funds being used to satisfy growing customer demand for package delivery service.
At the same time, authorities insist the new automated machine will not have an impact on jobs, stressing that the Appleton post office is presently hiring.
“This does not create any loss of jobs,” Schultz said. “We are hiring at all positions.”
The Small Unit Delivery Sorter now running at Appleton is the first of its kind in the state, though post offices in other states have also received such upgrades.
“It’s been a great change,” Schultz said. “The employees love it. It’s a lot easier for them to work with the high volume of parcels that we receive and it takes the human error factor out of it and lets us sort more accurately.”
