DANVILLE — As more and more personal and professional business is conducted online, the fallout for the U.S. Postal Service continues to compile.

People have been turned on to online bill-pay, have been receiving bill statements via their e-mail inbox instead of their USPS mailbox, and now use e-mail and online social media sites to stay connected with far away friends and family instead of sending handwritten letters in the mail.

“I bought a book of stamps last year and I still have half of them,” Amy McCarty of St. Joseph said.

McCarty has made a full switch in how she handles her personal finances by paying nearly every bill online. She said it’s been a year and a half since she ordered checks for her bank account.

So what’s delivered to McCarty’s mailbox at the end of her drive?

“Junk mail, lots and lots of junk mail,” McCarty said.

McCarty isn’t the only one cutting back on postal mail service. The USPS has witnessed a drop-off in mail volume from a peak of 213 billion pieces mailed in 2006 to just 177 billion pieces mailed in 2009. They anticipate post office usage will keep trending down during the next decade to a projected 150 billion pieces mailed in 2020.

“I use the Internet for everything,” McCarty said. “I pay all my bills online, except one, which is my garbage bill. I do all my banking online. Anything that makes my life a little easier, then I do it.”

McCarty said she appreciates being able to pay bills at three a.m. if she chooses. She also likes keeping track of things on her computer. Online banking can be done at all hours, and bill statements can be referred to months or years later, all without paper.

“I don’t have to keep a paper file in my house that takes up space,” McCarty said. “I don’t have to worry about missing or misplacing any bills. It’s all right there.”

With so many Americans moving toward the same philosophy as McCarty, the USPS has developed a new plan of action for the next decade that includes moving to a five-day delivery week, if Congress allows them.

By switching to a five-day delivery week, $3.3 billion will be saved the first year and $5.1 billion annually by 2020. If nothing is done, a $33 billion shortfall is projected by 2020.

Saturday home delivery would be eliminated, but post offices would remain open for business transactions.

Besides the move to five-day delivery, elimination of the prepayment of retiree health benefits (an estimated savings of $50 billion by 2020), pricing changes, and possibly consolidating some post offices, are all possibilities slated for the future of the USPS.

Existing laws must be changed to alter delivery frequency of the mail service. The fiscal year for USPS ends Oct. 31. If a change were agreed upon, the postal service says it would begin five-day a week service six months after the federal ruling, or as early in 2011 as possible to begin maximizing savings.

McCarty said she doesn’t see the postal service staying at six days a week for long. She said that as the population ages and using technology becomes a mainstay for everyone, the mail service will become secondary,

“I don’t see the postal service folding, but I see it down to one or two days a week and everyone going online,” McCarty said.

The USPS was started in 1775 with Benjamin Franklin appointed as the first Postmaster General by the Continental Congress.

Nearly 600,000 career workers are employed by the postal service, which if it were a private sector company would rank 28th in the 2009 Fortune 500, according to the USPS Web site.