It’s never too soon to start planning for retirement — and that means thinking about your Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) account.
The TSP is a retirement savings program for federal workers. On average, 7 out of 8 Postal Service employees contribute to the TSP.
You can’t control your Social Security benefits and you can’t control how your annuity is calculated, but you have full control over your TSP account.
If you’re under the Federal Employees Retirement System and you contribute at least 5 percent of your basic pay toward TSP, you receive a full matching contribution from USPS.
For 2019, the maximum amount you can contribute toward your TSP account is $19,000 if you are younger than 50, plus an additional $6,000 in catch-up contributions if you are 50 or older.
If you aren’t sure how much money you’ll need in retirement, you can use the online Federal Ballpark Estimate page to calculate approximately how much you need to save to fund a comfortable retirement.
When you’re ready, you can go to LiteBlue and use PostalEASE to make changes to your TSP account. You can also call the Human Resources Shared Service Center at 877-477-3273 and use the interactive voice response system to make changes.
The Financial Wellness LiteBlue page has videos and other resources to help you prepare for retirement. The TSP site also has information.