A Backup Plan for Postal Employees

If you can’t complete the PSHB enrollment online, you can still use a paper form SF 2809. Image: J.J. Gouin/Shutterstock.com
By: Lacie Harmon, Federal Employee Benefits Group

For many USPS employees, this Open Season has been less about choosing a health plan and more about wrestling with technology.

The intended path once you’re ready to make a change to or enroll in a plan is to start on LiteBlue, move into the Postal Service Health Benefits (PSHB) enrollment system, and complete your election online. But, for a lot of people, that process is breaking down somewhere along the way. (If you still need to weigh your options, you can use the PSHB section of the Consumers Checkbook online to compare available plans.)

The sequence looks like this: Go to LiteBlue (liteblue.usps.gov) and sign in using your Employee ID and USPS Self-Service Password. Once you are on the LiteBlue home page, go to the “What’s Happening” section and click the link that takes you to Postal Service Health Benefits or Open Season information. From there you are routed into the PSHB enrollment environment, where you are prompted to authenticate through login.gov.

That last part is where many employees are getting stuck this year. Some never receive the verification codes they need. Others fail the identity-proofing questions, even though their information is correct, or find it impossible to upload their driver’s license picture due to a finicky system. Sometimes the system shows an error message after several steps and sends the user back to the beginning.

This can be stressful when you know that Open Season has a hard deadline of Monday, Dec. 8th! None of us wants to risk losing coverage or missing our chance to change plans because of the whims of the technical gods (small “g” intended).

The good news is that plain, old-fashioned pen and paper will do the trick. If you can’t complete the PSHB enrollment online, you can still use a paper form SF 2809 and then upload the form and submit it via email (if you’re not sure how to upload documents or send emails, places like Office Depot, Staples or FedEx can help). Please note that though you can send the form by U.S. Mail, with the cutoff approaching quickly at the time of this printing, there may not be enough time.

Download form SF 2809 at the OPM website or have it printed out at one of the aforementioned stores, fill it out on your computer or by hand, and then submit it to the Human Resources Shared Service Center (HRSSC).

Here’s the process:

Complete SF 2809 with your chosen PSHB plan and coverage information and use a pen to “wet sign” it.
Prepare a brief accompanying email note that includes your full name, your employee ID, and a sentence saying the form is for enrollment in the 2026 plan year.
Upload the form and email it to F3PMJ0@usps.gov (last digit before the @ sign is a zero).
Keep copies of everything you send and any email confirmations or automatic replies. These serve as proof that you acted before the deadline even if processing takes time on the agency side.

In short, if you’re having trouble with the technology of it all, don’t stop there. Use SF 2809, and submit it by email before the close of business on Monday. The goal is simple: get your election on record before the deadline, even when the websites and apps don’t cooperate.

Lacie Harmon, Federal Benefits Group, is a Federal Benefits and Retirement Specialist who helps federal employees understand and maximize their benefits, both during employment and retirement years. She teaches regularly at federal agencies and offers monthly federal retirement webinars. Past classes taught include for clients such as the FAA and GAO, as well as union locals of the APWU and NALC. She can be reached at: https://www.lacieharmon.com/

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