With United Airlines said to be responsible for over 14,000 lbs of Saipan-bound mail delayed in Guam, another airline continues its talk with the U.S Postal Services regarding their interest in assisting and improving the delivery of mail in the CNMI.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re trying to talk to the U.S Postal Services for several years now,\u201d Star Marianas Air president Shaun Christian told Saipan Tribune. <\/p>\n
However, Star Marianas wasn\u2019t aware or notified when the bidding process for mail carrier was started and was eventually awarded to United Airlines just last year. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe were never notified of any previous bids apparently were out sometime last year,\u201d Christian said.<\/p>\n
Christian said they have sought USPS on how they can be notified once there is a bidding process out for carrying mail in the CNMI.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re trying to find out where these bids or requests for bids are published,\u201d Christian said.<\/p>\n
He added that they are listed in the government supplier award management system, and have access to the Federal Business Opportunities website but they weren\u2019t able to see any bids come up.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe we\u2019re not looking in the right place? I don\u2019t know,\u201d Christian said.<\/p>\n
Saipan Tribune learned that United has 18 months left in their contract with USPS and that it will only look into securing future services once the existing contract is finished.<\/p>\n
According to Christian, they were advised by USPS to communicate with United Airlines with regards to subcontracting.<\/p>\n
However, Star Marianas was concerned about 14 CFR 298.35 or the \u201climitations on carriage of mail\u201d which states \u201can air taxi operator or commuter air carrier is not authorized to carry mail except pursuant to contract with the U.S. Postal Service.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we got the message from the Post Office, we became a little bit concerned because they\u2019re telling us to contact United,\u201d Christian said, \u201cWith the airlines of our size and air taxi operators, it seems to contradict what the Post Office is saying because the law seems to say that there has to be a direct contract with the Postal Service.\u201d <\/p>\n
On a similar note, Star Marianas noted that United has been subcontracting the carriage of mail to air taxi operators as they have observed Szabo Aerospace, LLC aircraft delivering mail to Tinian and Business Air\/AirNow as well as Arctic Circle Air, LLC aircraft delivering mail to Saipan.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re trying to find out from the post office how they\u2019re able to do that without a direct contract, or maybe they have a direct contract, we don\u2019t know for sure, but there does seem to be confusion in the way USPS is directing us,\u201d Christian said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re willing, able, and have the capability to assist with the mail process. We just need to understand what is it that we need to do and we\u2019re a little bit confused based upon the instructions to go to the United as to how that complies to federal regulations,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Christian said they have the fleet and would have the authority to do it based on their operations specifications with the Federal Aviation Authority. They now also have a base of operations on Guam and operate daily scheduled flights to the island.<\/p>\n
He added that Star Marianas \u201ccertainly can\u201d deliver mail daily to all three islands of the CNMI\u2014 as opposed to only the current two deliveries per week on Tinian on Tuesdays and Fridays.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhatever we can do to improve on that,\u201d Christian said, noting that they too are consumers of the postal service.
\n\u201cWe would love to be able to assist in improving this delivery,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
14,000 lbs in delayed mail<\/strong><\/p>\n Last Sunday, concerned resident Dr. Philip Dauterman aired his distress to the media regarding delivery delays of several packages.<\/p>\n He said he has been contacting both Guam and Saipan post offices with regards to packages \u201cscanned in Guam in late February, then seemingly disappeared.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPer phone call to Juan at the C.K. Saipan office, United Airlines has 14,000 lbs of Saipan-bound mail delayed at the Guam airport and unable to send to Saipan in a timely manner. This affects the entire CNMI with delayed inbound mail,\u201d Dauterman said.<\/p>\n Saipan Tribune sent an email to United Airlines Sunday afternoon but was unable to receive comments as of press time. <\/p>\n Just last month, the U.S Department of Justice started an investigation on whether top airlines are complying with contracts to carry mail cargo for the USPS. Civil investigative demand was sent out to United Continental Holdings Inc., Delta Air Lines Inc., and American Airlines Group Inc. about the USPS mail they carry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With United Airlines said to be responsible for over 14,000 lbs of Saipan-bound mail delayed…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[26,51,5450,1218],"class_list":["post-222565","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","tag-cnmi","tag-guam","tag-star-marianas-air","tag-usps"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222565"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222565\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}