For a while my cell phone number was stamped on the tags of a dog who kept jumping his fence. I guess his owner had had the number before I did.
So I would get these calls from people saying “I’ve got your dog!” It was really sad because they were all pumped because they were doing a good deed and returning a lost pet and I would be like “Uh … I don’t have a dog.” I think they thought I was just trying to ditch him.
After this happened a couple of times I figured out what was going on. “When you find his real owner, call me back and give me his new number!” I would say. “Then I can give it to the next person who finds him!”
For a few weeks last month I kept getting voicemails from some company in an automated voice looking for Steven Johnson.
I am a girl. My name is not Steven.
And since my phone is on silent a lot of the day or off when I am in class or work, it took weeks before they called (well, the computer called) and I was able to answer it. I had to press a few buttons and they finally quit calling.
But it sucked when I opened my phone “Ooh I have a voicemail!” and it was for Steven. It’s not uncommon that I will get a voicemail but no missed call when my phone is on. I hate that, especially since my voicemail does not tell me what time the voicemail was left. I’ve gotten ones days later and that always sucks. Missed out on a kegger once because of that. The vmail was from Saturday night and I got the voicemail on Monday.
But that is pretty jacked up that some family has the wrong number for all those important things.
You should just change your message to say “NICK AND CYNTHIA DO NOT LIVE HERE. GO TO THEIR HOUSE AND YELL AT THEM FOR NOT BEING COURTEOUS ENOUGH TO GIVE YOU THEIR NEW NUMBER!”
I’m getting this right now, but in regards to my mail. For some unfathomable reason, the people who lived here before us either didn’t change their address with the post office or they did and it didn’t take for some reason. I think half the mail we’ve gotten since we’ve lived here is for them. I’ve delivered it to them (they live nearby) like a good sort, but winter is coming and I think I’m gonna start returning to sender.
The scariest one, though, was last week when the son got some sort of writ of seizure served against him, with “FINAL” and “48 HEURES” and “AVEC SERRURIER” written all over it, to the effect (the paper was not in an envelope) that he was owing several hundred dollars to the City and if he didn’t pay up pronto, they were going to basically break into his (our) house and take all of his (our) stuff! Having no particular desire to get repoed for someone else’s debts (I have enough of my own, thank you, including this phantom dishwasher I really should contact Sears about), I hied my butt down to the borough hall, not even pausing to change out of the grunge-style transgender rights teeshirt I had on, and politely yelled at them until they filed some sort of official FOR THE LOVE OF GAWD, DON’T REPO MY STUFF paper. I still have it taped to my front door.
That really sucks. We’ve been in our house for nearly three years now, and we’re still getting stuff for the previous owners. After battling with Canada Post for a year (“Not Here. Return to Sender” means nothing to these people - I have to actually black out our address to get them to return it to sender), I just throw their mail in the recycling now (whole - anybody want to steal their identity?). But I have never noticed anything with those scary phrases on it, and I hope I never do!
When I moved I would get mailboxes full of mail for the prior resident. She was a nurse, apparently. Used to go to UCSF. One would imagine she’s a fairly intelligent person, so I don’t really understand why she was apparently too stupid to forward her goddamn mail!
I used to put return to sender and block out my address but after awhile I got tired of spending 20 minutes at the mailbox every day. Now I just throw it in the trash. Screw her.
Heh, I work for Canada Post, I don’t know how it works in the States (or elsewhere for that matter), but here in Canada you can’t “get you address changed with the postal service”.
You CAN pay $35 bucks to get a “change of address notification”. That bad boy is an orange card the the person who sorts your mail puts in the box at the sortation plant. theoretically every piece of mail of yours that goes to the old address gets intercepted by whoever sorts your mail and sent to someone who puts a little yellow sticker with your new address over top of the old address.
The little orange cards suck…bad…I hate them…I NEVER get every single piece of mail. (I sort a little more than 2000 addresses )
Also, the orange card is good for 6 monthes, then it gets filed. You can get 1 year ones but I think they’re $75.
That’s a little off the topic, but…meh
One final thing if you write MOVED in really big letters right on the front of the envelope it’s policy to take them back to the plant and they get RTS’d.
If your letter carrier isn’t doing that, I’d call the post office and bitch about it.
It’s hella annoying to get someone else’s mail.
(I can’t believe this is what managed to drag me out of lurker-hood)
I’m actually surprised at the amount of mail I DON’T get for other people here at the house. I’ve gotten maybe 5 pieces of mail for other people in the year I’ve been here - but addressed to 5 different people.
The first one was a gas bill to the old owner. I actually knew his address and according to the USPS Web site I could cross out my street address and put his in since he lives in the same city.
I am waiting for something to happen like what happened to matt_mcl. This house has been a rental for over 25 years prior to me buying it. According to the neighbors and to what I knew when I was living down the street, some skeevy folks have lived here.
I’m afraid someone’s drug customers are going to walk up to the door and want to see their dealer in a drunken stupor one night, or an old tennant will break in to go to sleep like you see on TV. Hopefully they wait until I have my blackbelt to try this stunt. Kiya!!
Nick and Cynthia, though…they will never get to see me Unleash The Fury
I thought about that. Federal law says you can’t tamper with someone else’s mail, right? I’m not doing that. The mail is reaching it’s intended destination, my mailbox. I’m not opening it, replying to it or anything like that, I’m simply throwing it in the trashbin next to my mailbox.
Now, if I was taking mail out of someone else’s mailbox and throwing it away, that would be one thing. But it’s my mailbox, so in my opinion, I’m under no legal obligation to make sure misaddressed mail makes it to it’s intended recipient. I am not employed by the post office, therefore, it’s not my problem. Any other interpretation would require me to sit there, spending my time every day marking “no longer at this address” on umpteen pieces of mail for an indeterminate amount of time. Sounds like involuntary servitude to me.
Of course, I have absolutely no legal authority to back me up on this one, it’s purely my own logic.
We got our first cellphone in May and within days we began getting calls for Gerry. It seems that Gerry had requested quotes for windows, vinyl siding, HVAC systems, etc. and had asked lenders for money for these projects. We got calls from all kinds of places. They tapered off last month, finally.
She may well have put in a valid forward with the USPS. I moved once some years ago, submitted a change of address with the post office, naming everyone whose mail should get forwarded. Six weeks later, having gotten NO mail that entire time, a friend went by my old place (which was still vacant), and found my entire mail accumulation stuffed in the box. They had never bothered to even TRY to forward one single piece.
Apparently my phone calls people while I’m not looking. I’ve gotten calls where the guy says “I received a call from this number earlier - who are you and what do you want?” Except that I don’t know the guy, my phone’s been in my backpack all day because I’m in the lab, and it’s a flip phone so it’s not like it can dial random numbers if a pencil bumps against it.
And I’ll get long messages on my voicemail that basically sound like someone’s phone has called me from a pocket somewhere. Muffled sound, maybe traffic, blurry voices… At first I thought it was a friend’s phone speed-dialing me from a pocket or purse. If they didn’t lock the keypad, and it’s not a flip phone, it could happen. But no, it’s never a number I recognize. I’ve called back a couple of times to ask what the hell’s going on, but the person (never the same person) says they have no clue, they never called me.
I had something similar to that at one of my apartments. The person who used to live there never chagned his address with ANYONE. (He was somewhat of a friend turned aquaintence (if that makes sense)). For a long time, I sent everything back with a message on the front saying “RETURN TO SENDER, KAI DOES NOT LIVE HERE ANYMORE, NO FOWARDING ADDRESS” Then I started openeing it. I wonder if he ever found out his licensce was revoked.
(I suppose I could have gotten it to him, he only moved a block away)
Pretty sure that opening it is illegal. [urlhttp://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20040317/ai_n12773774]This asserts that that’s illegal in the UK.
I accidentally mis-dialed my husband’s cell phone number the other day - hit a 6 instead of a 3. So some lady answers the phone. My first thought is: my husband lost his phone out of his pocket, and this lady heard it ringing and picked it up.
Lady: Hello?
Me, bewildered, “Hello? This is my husband’s phone.”
Lady: “Ooookay, right.” click
Then I looked at the number I had dialed. Oops. Then I dialed the right number and got the right guy.
I suppose that lady thought it was some sort of skeevy messed up marriage situation. I wanted to call her back and say “Sorry, I had the wrong number!” but didn’t want to find out what she’d say a second time.
