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QUINCY, ILL. -- Next day mail delivery could become be a thing of the past for Quincy residents.

The Quincy Processing and Distribution Center could consolidate with the Springfield facility as early as next month.

That would make your next day delivery from Quincy to other areas difficult.

Despite the warning, many of them are nervous about their jobs.

"They're telling us the plan is to shut this place down and move mail processing to Springfield in two stages," Quincy Area Local President of the American Postal Workers Union, Vaughn Harshman said. "The first stage is to send the 623 mail to Springfield in August, that's the Quincy and local towns on this side of the river. The postal office is planning to keep the Hannibal and Kirksville mail that the 634 and 635 still being worked here."

"Which means that Quincy will not have next day delivery, but northeast Missouri would," Quincy Mayor John Spring said. "It just makes no sense whatsoever."

Quincy postal workers have known about a merge since last year but employees have just started hearing about the two stage process. There is no final approval from headquarters on the Quincy to Springfield merger.

"It's pretty easy to say that it doesn't make people happy," Harshman said. "There's a lot of uncertainty and uncertainty is not helpful to your mental outlook."

"This is not using common sense," Mayor Spring said. "It shows the dysfunctionality of the postal service right now. The mere fact that St. Louis ... this is all posted on the USPS website and St. Louis, St. Louis region act like they don't know anything about it."

Postal workers have a union contract that gives them the option to take new jobs within 50 miles of their current jobs. Seven postal employees have received letters that they are involuntarily assigned to mail carrier positions starting in August. According to the U.S. Postal Services website, the facility will remain open until January 2014.

"We're still getting paid, our job is to move the mail," Harshman said. "That needs to be our focus and it is our focus but at the same time there's that uncertainty of what's it going to be like next year, next month, next week ... we don't know."

The U.S. postal service will consolidate 140 mail processing centers within the next year, including 48 this August and another 89 closings would occur in 2014.

Earlier this week U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin sent Postmaster General Patrick Donahue a letter asking him to keep the Quincy and Rockford processing centers open. Both facilities were rated highly efficient.