I ordered something online from eBay, it was really cheap only $3.00 but instead of putting it in my mailbox the mail person throws it on top of all the mailboxes. I was like <sarcasm>real happy</sarcasm> about that.
Now I don’t have very much mail so I only go to my mailbox once or twice a week. Even then it’s usually empty as I do almost everything onliine.
So anyway, I open my mailbox and I see WHY the mail person left the small package, which could’ve easily fit in my mailbox, outside my mailbox.
I have census forms in MY mailbox. There are 50 some flats in my building and I have FORTY-SEVEN census forms in my mailbox.
Yes, evidently the census sent out a “last chance” form to fill out in case I missed the two reminder letters and the previous census form they sent (Which I filled and mailed back weeks ago.)
I feel like filling them all out with fake names and mailing them back.
OK this is no big deal really but it shows how lazy my mail person is.
One of the Dopers is the wife of a postal examiner. Hopefuly someone will link her to this thread, and she can say who to contact – I suspect your local Postmaster, but am not sure – to complain about the unconscionable delivery errors.
My mailman’s lazy, too. If I have to sign for something, he won’t even come up and knock on the door. I just get the slip in my mailbox saying that he couldn’t deliver it and will come back the next day, then I have to watch and wait for him to sign and get whatever it is. Bastard lazy mailman.
Well, my husband is just a letter carrier, but I’d suggest calling your local office and asking to speak to the delivery supervisor and explaining the problem.
Alternately, calling the Census Office might be quite productive in terms of an effect!
I’ve been getting a lot of wrong mail. I’ve seen the mailman delivering mail within our complex. He’s an old guy, maybe in his 70s… I don’t think he’s lazy–just that maybe he’s not seeing the number right. I don’t want to but I’m to the point of complaining because it’s been happening a lot lately and I’m concerned that some of my mail is getting mis-delivered too.
Last summer, I was subletting an apartment from a classmate. Most of the area is single-family homes but this was a little complex of three apartments. The guy who had the lease moved out about two days before I moved in. Apparently, the mail guy saw him loading up his car, and decided that meant that unit A was now unoccupied, and stopped delivering the mail, despite the fact that mail was arriving addressed by name to people at Unit A. I ended up needing to go up to the Post Office to complain and very firmly request that he please deliver the mail. Eventually he did, in a sense: I got my mail, but there was a 1-in-3 chance that I got it from the people in Unit B or C rather than my mailbox. There was also a pretty good chance I had mail for one of them in my box. Packages, to - I would think that if you’re delivering something to 123 Street Rd, Unit A, you wouldn’t leave it at the door with a great big B on it, but I apparently am not wise to the ways of the postman.
Current delivery guy is great, though - he’ll bring packages to the door, knock, and wait a reasonable amount of time even if he doesn’t need a signature.
I’ve been getting a lot of wrong mail too, but only one or two times a month (but for many months). It makes me think it’s a substitute carrier of some sort that does it.
I don’t understand why it happens, either. My house number is 123 and I keep getting mail for 146. Not the numbers that are more similar and physically closer to mine - 113 and 133. Nope, 146. Our names aren’t remotely similar or anything.
Thursday I got the mail and EVERY piece was for 146. I took it and wrapped it up in a large-print letter for the mailman that I typed out, pointing out the problem and finishing up with “look, I don’t want to go over your head with this. Just try to get it right.”
Oddly enough, when I went to put the bundle in my mailbox that night - after I had already emptied it of the day’s mail - there was some mail in my box. I suspect it had been placed there by a neighbor who accidentally got my mail.
I had a terrible mailman for a while at a previous location. We got mail for people on different streets all the time, and once I got a package FROM one of my neighbors TO someone in another STATE in my mailbox. How does that even happen? It hadn’t even been postmarked yet–it had clearly been picked up at one of my neighbors’ mailboxes and then put into mine.
I used to have problems with my mailman not bringing the mail some Mondays - look, I always get mail. It’s mostly junk, but there’s always something. So I e-mailed the bit on the USPS website where it asked if you were having delivery problems, and then I noticed my mailbox grew a barcode. The mailman scans it every time he brings the mail.
I always wonder if he spits in it out of spite, but oh well - shoulda brought it in the first place.
I just asked MrWhatsit, who is a mail carrier, about the OP. He said that first of all, it is very surprising to him that it is acceptable in the OP’s location for mail carriers to just leave packages out on top of the mailbox post, unless it’s a secure lobby, and even then he would find it a bit odd. Second, regarding all the wrong census forms in the OP’s mailbox, he said that if you have reason to believe (like, for example, because this mailman has a habit of doing such things in the past) that they were just all shoved in there because the mailman was too lazy to put one in each box like he is supposed to, then you should call up the guy’s delivery supervisor to complain. Or just call up the local P.O. and ask who the correct person is to make a delivery complaint to, because they might want you to talk to the postmaster or some other person instead. He also said that if they ask for your address, it’s not so they can personally identify you; it’s so they can figure out which carrier route you’re on, to identify your particular mailman.
Dunno how much that helps, but thought I’d pass it along.
Oh, Chicago, ha, ha. You should have mentioned that earlier. My family is in Ohio, and I’ve lived in Chicago and in Seattle over the years. Packages that my mom mailed to Seattle would routinely get there in 2-3 days. Chicago? Total crapshoot. Sometimes a week, sometimes two weeks, sometimes never. It’s like the mail goes into a postal black hole when it gets to Chicago. I feel for you, man.
My family is in Ohio, and I’ve lived in Chicago and in Seattle over the years. Packages that my mom mailed to Seattle would routinely get there in 2-3 days. Chicago? Total crapshoot. Sometimes a week, sometimes two weeks, sometimes never. It’s like the mail goes into a postal black hole when it gets to Chicago. I feel for you, man.