Postal Service shows profit during year-end holiday season

WASHINGTON – A strong holiday shipping season and a couple of favorable economic situations have temporarily turned around the financial fortunes of the Postal Service.

The post office reported a $307 million profit between October and December of 2015, as compared to a $754 million loss the previous year. That was in part because a 16 percent increase in package volume during the first quarter of the fiscal year.

But postal officials are warning that without favorable interest rate changes and a postal surcharge that will expire in April, they would have had a net loss of approximately $700 million in the first quarter.

The first quarter operating revenue was $19.3 billion, an increase of $613 million or 3.3 percent over the same period in the previous year.