Can I sue USPS for not getting a letter to a place on time?

[diggleblop]

Alright, say I had 10 days to get a letter to the Office of Workers' Comp. I decide to send it certified mail and am told it will take no longer tan 3 days.

I pay for certified mail and two weeks goes by and no certified mail receipt and Workers Comp still doesn't have the VERY IMPORTANT letters that I sent. I check it online with the tracking number today and the letter just got there on Thursday the 12th of June and yet it was sent on May 30th 2008. In turn, this causes my case to be postponed because according to the workers comp people, I didn't send in my paperwork on time.

But it was the post office's fault. Can something be done about this? Can I sue the post office? Also, if it is possible, have other people done this and were their outcomes favorable?

[dolphinboy]

I went to usps.gov to see what guarantees they offered but I couldn't find anything. It talks about Average Deliver Time but that's not the same as a guarantee.

I would suggest you register a complaint with the USPS and see if that gets you anywhere. Unfortunately I don't think you can do much at this point. Hopefully I'm wrong.

[Joey P]

Does the USPS guarantee their delivery times? UPS does, but all you'll get back is the shipping cost.

[Colibri]

Certified mail doesn't provide any guarantee of delivery times. If you wanted expedited delivery, you should have sent it by Priority Mail.

However, even Priority Mail (http://pe.usps.com/text/dmm300/123.htm) provides no guarantee of on-time delivery:

2.2 Service Objectives

All Priority Mail receives expeditious handling and transportation. The USPS follows uniform guidelines for distributing and delivering mail but does not guarantee delivery within the specified time. Local postmasters can provide more information.

You're out of luck.

[brazil84]

Certified mail doesn't provide any guarantee of delivery times. If you wanted expedited delivery, you should have sent it by Priority Mail.

However, even Priority Mail (http://pe.usps.com/text/dmm300/123.htm) provides no guarantee of on-time delivery:

Even if there were such a guarantee, you can bet there is a huge disclaimer for so-called "consequential damages"

[Pixilated]

If your receipt has a date on it, send a copy to WC and ask that it be placed in your file, showing that the delay was due to the USPS. That's what I did with mine. Good luck on your case, btw - and keep copies of everything!

[Darryl Lict]

I was sorely informed that FedEx's guarantee of delivery means that they will give you your postage back if it is not delivered in a timely fashion. Yeah, they gave me back my $15.75 after the SBA proposal that I spent a month working on didn't get delivered on time.

Yeah, you definitely should've sent it priority. 12 days is an exceedingly long period of time to deliver a letter, but I've been told that certified mail actually slows down the delivery process.

[dolphinboy]

They don't have a fax machine or you couldn't scan it and email it to them?

[commasense]

USPS' fastest service is Express Mail (http://www.usps.com/all/shippingandmailing/overnightguaranteedpackages.htm), which is guaranteed.

[Harriet the Spry]

I'm not optimistic about your odds against the post office, but like Pixilated says, get your ducks in a row and document when you sent stuff in to WC. In a similar situation, I have seen organized, persistent clients get exceptions made for deadlines. I hope it works out for you.

[TimeWinder]

USPS' fastest service is Express Mail (http://www.usps.com/all/shippingandmailing/overnightguaranteedpackages.htm), which is guaranteed.

....but the guarantee just gives you your postage back if they don't make it.

[Pixilated]

USPS' fastest service is Express Mail (http://www.usps.com/all/shippingandmailing/overnightguaranteedpackages.htm), which is guaranteed.


I've sent things Express before, and though it worked most of the time, it did not work all of the time.

[Jeff Lichtman]

No delivery service could afford to have an open-ended guarantee of timely delivery. Suppose someone lost a hundred million dollars because it took a week to deliver a letter when it was supposed to take two days. There must be a limit to their liability, and generally they set the limit at the cost of the service.

Many businesses face similar situations. For example, most photo finishers limit their liability in cases of loss or damage to the cost of the film. They wouldn't be able to stay in business if they guaranteed the value of the pictures themselves.

[diggleblop]

I understand about the guarantees and whatnot. They may have cost me my whole case today. A case that has been in the works and active for 5 years now. I sent this damn information back to them two weeks early to be safe and yet the fucking post office screws up. So ya can't sue them, huh?

To all who wished me luck, I appreciate it. Thanks.

And yeah, I know how these guys work. In fact, this is OWCP, FEDERAL Workers Comp to top things off. They are like dealing with a bunch of phantoms. The only way to talk to your case worker is to leave them a message on their audix system, then they never call you back. Ever.

When you get letters from them, the only way they will accept it back is through the mail, then you have to mail it to Kentucky to their mail facility. There they scan all mail into their systems and it goes to the appropriate files. High tech stuff, you know... lol

[KneadToKnow]

So ya can't sue them, huh?
If the modern world has taught us anything, it's that you can sue anybody over anything.

You didn't ask if you could win.

[iamthewalrus(:3=]

No delivery service could afford to have an open-ended guarantee of timely delivery. Suppose someone lost a hundred million dollars because it took a week to deliver a letter when it was supposed to take two days. There must be a limit to their liability, and generally they set the limit at the cost of the service.

Many businesses face similar situations. For example, most photo finishers limit their liability in cases of loss or damage to the cost of the film. They wouldn't be able to stay in business if they guaranteed the value of the pictures themselves.There's no reason that a business couldn't offer such a guarantee; you'd just have to pay for it.

For example, the USPS offers insurance on things getting lost or destroyed in the mail, up to a certain amount (and you pay by the amount). Currently, the insurance you get on a package can only be up to the actual value of the contents, but there's no reason that they couldn't change that rule. Basically, instead of refunding you the actual amounts in case of loss, they'd refund a pre-determined bounty if they fail to meet whatever deadline they've claimed. As long as they have good data about their delivery statistics, they should be able to find an underwriter who'd take that risk.

The pizza places that give you free pizza if it's late could give you 100 free pizzas for each late one. They'd just have to charge more for it, and no one seems to care enough. Given the potential downside of missing a deadline, I'm surprised that no delivery company offers such insurance.

[mhendo]

USPS' fastest service is Express Mail (http://www.usps.com/all/shippingandmailing/overnightguaranteedpackages.htm), which is guaranteed.But doesn't that sort of beg the OP's question?

The issue is not whether the delivery is guaranteed, but what the remedy is when delivery fails to happen within the guaranteed time, and whether you have legal recourse through the court system.

Anyone can offer a guarantee, but a guarantee is effectively worthless if the available remedies don't provide compensation that approaches the victim's actual loss. Offering a refund of postage if the package doesn't make it on time is completely useless to a person who might have missed out on thousands of dollars' worth of business or (in the OP's case) speedy resolution of a Workers' Compensation case.

It's like a professional photo lab that fucks up the 1,500 shots that a photographer took at a wedding, and offers to reimburse him for the film. The remedy fails utterly to compensate for the actual loss.

[633squadron]

The issue is not whether the delivery is guaranteed, but what the remedy is when delivery fails to happen within the guaranteed time, and whether you have legal recourse through the court system.

It's like a professional photo lab that fucks up the 1,500 shots that a photographer took at a wedding, and offers to reimburse him for the film. The remedy fails utterly to compensate for the actual loss.

I agree. In the hypothetical you propose, the photographer could sue and so could his or her client. The photographer could claim compensatory damages equal to time lost, loss of income from sales, etc. Both could claim punitive damages.

In the case of the OP, though, it's not clear what the damages are. Instead, the best thing to do is to send evidence that the USPS screwed up, and hope for the best.

And next time, send via Express Mail and notify the recipient that he's mailed it Express Mail (perhaps even with witnesses) and follow up the day after it's supposed to be delivered and chase after the USPS if it isn't delivered that day.

Guarantees mean nothing when it comes to deliveries, anyway. If the airplane that's carrying your letter crashes, then what? The best you can do is find out what's going on.

[KneadToKnow]

There's no reason that a business couldn't offer such a guarantee; you'd just have to pay for it.
Where's the return on that investment, though? Are enough new customers going to spring for this service to (a) recoup the overhead costs of getting it off the ground and (b) cover the costs of the fraudulent claims made?

[Gfactor]

This is a good discussion of postal service liablity: http://www.ct.gov/ag/cwp/view.asp?A=1770&Q=281804 (postal service only liable to the extent it has agreed to be).

And see Dolan v. USPS: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/05pdf/04-848.pdf ("Congress intended to retain immunity, as a general rule, only for injuries arising, directly or consequentially, because mail either fails to arrive at all or arrives late, in damaged condition, or at the wrong address," but Service remains liable for other negligence in course of delivery, such as negligently leaving the package on a porch)

and: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/23/politics/politicsspecial1/23scotus.html?_r=1&oref=login

[diggleblop]

In the case of the OP, though, it's not clear what the damages are. Instead, the best thing to do is to send evidence that the USPS screwed up, and hope for the best.

Finally, we're getting to the answer to my initial question. Thank you. The damages in the instance are having my case put on hold and my monthly compensation check cut off. God knows what I may have to do to get my case turned back on. see, OWCP now thinks that I didn't send my information in on time, when in fact, I did. I sent it two weeks ahead of schedule and now, thanks to the USPS, it took 13 days to get there and it's STILL WAITING FOR A SIGNATURE !!

http://www.ct.gov/ag/cwp/view.asp?A=1770&Q=281804

This link states that the United States can't be sued. So this basically tells me that the Postal Service can pretty do anything they want with your mail and get away with it. That's not right. No accountability at all. Screw the 3 bucks I spent, I'd rather have the$_____ bucks a month in workers comp payments that may be cut off from me here shortly.

[diggleblop]

You didn't ask if you could win.


Actually, I kinda did.

Here:

Also, if it is possible, have other people done this and were their outcomes favorable?

[commasense]

My reference to USPS Express Mail was intended to counter several earlier posts that talked about Priority Mail as a better, and possibly faster, alternative to Certified. In fact, Priority Mail is often no faster than ordinary first class, and has no guaranteed delivery date.

If the OP had used Express Mail, chances are extremely good his envelope would have been delivered the very next day, and if not, probably the day after that at the latest. Certainly not more than ten days later.

A question to the OP: Did you ask the postal clerk about all your delivery options, or did you only ask how long Certified would take? Did you consider Priority or Express, both of which could have provided a return receipt?

[Desert Nomad]

I just received a letter yesterday from a US government agency that was posted in February... that is to say it reached my Nevada address yesterday, nearly 5 months after it was sent.

[Dead Cat]

They don't have a fax machine or you couldn't scan it and email it to them?Even in this day and age, many businesses will only act on signed original documents, which rules out fax or e-mail. I don't know if this is one of those cases, but it may well be.

[Tom Tildrum]

Save whatever tracking information you can, particularly if it shows the date you mailed the letter. If you write to the relevant office with an explanation that the lateness of the filing was caused by an unusually long mail delay, and back it up with tracking information, they may cut you a break.

[diggleblop]

Did you ask the postal clerk about all your delivery options, or did you only ask how long Certified would take? Did you consider Priority or Express, both of which could have provided a return receipt?

Well, I pretty much know about all the options, as I've used just about all of them in the past when I used to sell on eBay. I sent it Certified because I knew that it only takes about 2-3 days TOPS to get to Kentucky, plus there is some sort of verification of receipt. That's all I really needed because I had two whole weeks before the letters that I mailed were due. There was really no rush. If there had been a rush, I would've used express or even overnight certified, but I had two weeks to deliver. The whole problem is is that it took them the whole two weeks to deliver a certified mail envelope.

see:
www.usps.com and here is the tracking number:

70062760000422888110

AND THEY STILL HAVEN'T PICKED IT UP YET !!!

[Jeff Lichtman]

My experience with the USPS on-line tracking system is that they seldom keep proper track of the progress of the package - they often only scan it when it reaches its destination. It's possible that your letter has actually been picked up and is close to delivery but that they haven't put that info in the database. Of course, this makes the tracking system next to useless - all you can reliably tell is whether the package has been delivered.

[ratatoskK]

here is the tracking number:

70062760000422888110
It just arrived:Label/Receipt Number: 7006 2760 0004 2288 8110
Status: Delivered

Your item was delivered at 5:19 PM on June 17, 2008 in LONDON, KY 40741.

[diggleblop]

I just saw that earlier. Thank Goodness ! haha, I was ONE DAY late ! I had until the 16th to get my paperwork in there, hopefully my case worker will see what happened. I did send her a letter (overnight) yesterday letting her know the situation and I also gave her usps.com and the tracking number so she can see fer herself. Woohoo ! I'm happy now. lol Thansk all ! I appreciate all the help.

[SeanArenas]

I one time paid extra to have a notebook computer overnight delivered to me. It took the carrier 3 business days to deliver it - I can't remember if this was UPS or Fedex.

I asked the carrier to reimburse me for the difference between 3 day shipping and overnight shipping. They said they can't refund it to me since I didn't pay for it to start with, but that they would refund it to the company I bought the notebook from.

The company that I bought the notebook from refused to find a way to refund that shipping amount to me. Somehow, the place I bought the notebook from (who you know is already outrageously overcharging me for the shipping rate) made an extra $28.94 because *I* had to wait for my notebook.

I don't know what kind of recompense a shipper or receiver has against the shipping company.