Intro to CDS

Did you know that Contract Delivery Service (CDS) is $440 million dollar industry, utilizing over 4,800 independent small business owners on over 7,000 contracts? Contract Delivery Services (CDS) is one way of meeting this demand while keeping control of business expenses.

If you are interested in becoming USPS CDS supplier, have recently placed an offer on a solicitation, received your first award of a contract or have been in the business for years and just want to refresh your business skills, you have come to the right spot to learn more about the Contract Delivery Service industry.

A box delivery highway contract route (HCR) is a contract agreement between the Postal Service and a private individual or firm for the delivery and collection of mail from homes and businesses. The services provided by the Contract Delivery Service (CDS) box delivery carrier are identical to those provided by postal rural route carriers. The supplier, (private individual or firm), depending upon the contract requirements, performs specified duties such as maintaining a roster of customers; casing mail; selling stamps, certified mail, collect on delivery (COD), Express Mail , registered mail, Parcel Post , merchandise returns, or money orders; picking up mail from collection boxes; and markup and forwarding of mail.

A route may be operated personally by the supplier (owner-operator) or the supplier may elect to hire employees (hired driver). If hired employees are used regularly, they must be paid the wages and fringe benefits as required by the Department of Labor current wage determination attached to the contract and taxes must be properly and timely submitted to the area local, state and federal agencies as required, which the contract is in operation.