Columbia Post Office prepared for busiest day of year

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COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - With 10 days until Christmas, people are making the transition from shopping to shipping. Monday is the busiest day for Post Offices across the nation where the U.S. Postal Service expects to ship 640 million pieces of mail in one day.

With it being the Post Office's busiest day, postal workers are trying to make it easier on everyone.

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Even though it's the busiest day of the year, USPS officials say they are ready for the crowds.

"We are prepared to help you in the lobbies in many of our high traffic Post Offices," said Harry Spratlin with the Greater South Carolina Postal District. "We have lobby greeters in place -- lobby assistants, I should say, and they'll be there in the peak periods to help customers go through. Look to them for help. They'll help you with your package and fill out your forms and get through the line quickly. We're rated on how we serve the customer and how well we can keep them out of line. Our wait time in line scores we have to work on those and make them better."

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, Post Offices are expected to handle 15.5 billion cards, letters and packages nationwide compared to 14.7 billion last year.

It's the last day to use standard shipping to get your items to their destinations by Christmas. The postage goes up the closer we get to Christmas. Saturday is the last day to ship using First Class and Priority Mail. December 23rd is the last day to use Priority Mail Express.

"Shipping costs are not going up this year," Spratlin said. "Gas prices, I think, have been a windfall for folks and shipping prices are good with us. We're the best game out there for shipping prices. The dates to mail your items are growing shorter now. We're getting closer to the holiday. It's time to stop shopping and time to start shipping,"

USPS officials say the busiest branches in the Midlands will be the main branch off Assembly Street and the two branches in Lexington.