USPS hiring for peak season and beyond as military holiday shipping deadline approaches

CHICAGO (WLS) -- On the edge of O'Hare Airport property is where mail for U.S. service men and women is processed.

"It's separating by the zips so it can get to the right bases and ships," said Frances Locke, International Military Service Center in-plant support manager for USPS. "Soldiers really look forward to the care packages."

The site is the United States Postal Service International Military Service Center and it's about to get even busier with the holidays approaching with volume already up 30% at USPS.

"It's going to be a mad rush and the empty you see now, you won't see because it's only going to pick up," Locke said.

RELATED: Post Office holidays 2021: USPS releases holiday deadlines to know

The facility expects to handle 12 million pieces of mail in the coming weeks, and in order to do that they want to hire at least 100 more people throughout USPS for the peak season and beyond.

There was even a hiring event at St. Sabina Wednesday, with others expected to be held in the coming days.

"We need to make sure that we have trained people to work our letters, our flats, our parcels -- our small parcels that go on the machine and our large parcels that have to be worked manually," Locke said.

RELATED: USPS careers: US Postal Service hiring for several positions in Chicago area

If you're looking to send multiple items to one location, experts advise sending smaller parcels rather than one big box.

"Then it's handled manually and it's slower," Locke said. "The machine, if it's a smaller parcel, it goes faster [and] it goes out the same day."

The USPS deadline to send to military addresses by Christmas is December 9. The deadline for first-class mail service is Dec. 17.