My mail delivery is not erratic at all. I have to drive 20 minutes to the POB to pick it up. That’s on me.
There is no mail delivery where I live. The entire county.
We get very little mail and what little we do get almost always goes straight to the trash. All of our bills are electronic now. I also use the USPS informed delivery and figure out when enough garbage has accumulated in the mailbox to justify the walk to the end of our driveway (I’m mostly kidding here - it isn’t that far, but I don’t go out most days because there is nothing in it except for one postcard from Anderson windows or something like that).
I like to have some idea what’s on the way, and the mailboxes are at the other end of the apartment complex, so in bad weather (90+ heat, rain, etc.) I’d rather not make the trip for mere junk or an empty mailbox. I started doing Informed Delivery (which does offer an emailed summary each day) when I got zero mail for a week (never did figure out what was going on there).
Those don’t seem to be a thing here since about 2020.
For those of you who shovel out 5 or 6 (or 20) hunks of junk mail every day there is a solution.
Opt out of credit card solicitations via this government sanctioned process: OptOutPrescreen.com. Also opt out of junk mail using these folks: DMAchoice is a mail preference service offered by the ANA.
These are both 100% legit. The difference is remarkable but it takes about 3 months for the junk to taper off. Hint: if you live in an apartment there’s no practical reason not to add prior tenant(s)’ name(s) to your DMA account at your current address. You certainly get enough mail to know how to spell their name right, and it will not affect their junk mail at their current address.
About all that you’ll be left with is flyers from local businesses who aren’t big enough to use DMA-compliant mailing services.
Works great.
The DMA direct mail folks want $5 by credit card to opt out. Wish they’d said that before I laboriously filled in all those data fields.
Wow. They’ve never charged me. Sorry to hear that’s changed.
I’ve been a subscriber since 198-mumble-mumble though.
In my case, a.) there are days when the mail carrier doesn’t stuff the mail all the way down the slot into the mailbox, despite my signage, and it can be swiped out the top, so I want to see what should have been in there, and b.) If mail comes for one of my daughters, I can just forward them the email so they can see if they need to make a special trip this way.
Also, during the pandemic, the replacement mail carriers as often than not misdelivered the mail. Nice to see what I was supposed to receive.
Da nada. I was just surprised. Typical of direct mailers though-you’ll have to pay us to not pester you daily clogging your mail box with 100s of pieces of worthless crap obscuring the one piece of real mail every few weeks* that you might actually want.
*although I am having trouble recalling a recent piece of mail in the past few months that held any interest. The monthly Costco sale brochure maybe? But even that is not unsolicited-I’m a member. I guess if I signed up for the annual Doper Shot Glass Exchange that would be mail worth looking forward to.
Nah, I hear they come empty.
This would bring a tear of joy to the eye of any gerrymandering politician.
I live at (say) 14967 Main Street. I routinely get mail for 14697 Main St., because those numbers are just SO CLOSE that anyone could be excused for mixing them up. Again and again. And again.
On Saturday I got 14697’s ballot for the November election. Sorry to be a crab about this, but I think misdelivering a ballot ought to get the letter carrier instantly sacked, one strike and you’re out. Nobody gives a shit, though.
Ordinarily I hand-deliver the misdelivered mail to the lady who lives at 14697, though she never returns any of my mail or packages. I did have a package traced once, and the mail person got her to fork it over.
But with a ballot, I was scared to touch it, so I put it back in my box marked “delivered to wrong address” with the flag up on Sunday. It sat there all day Monday and was finally picked up Tuesday. We used to get mail every day, not any more I guess. It’s very depressing.
Today, once again. our mail was not picked up. And there is a notice up for it.
A lot of mail is misdelivered in my neighborhood, so Informed Delivery helps me know if there’s something important to watch for or bring to USPS’s attention. Unlike a lot of people, I guess, I still have some friends I correspond with by letter.
Mail delivery got pretty spotty and inaccurate when our long-term carrier either retired or got reassigned.
Things have gotten better since they put the house number inside the door of the mailbox (plus, I think we finally have a consistent person delivering - for a while it seemed like a new one every day).
Mini brag: our current mailman is absolutely great. We get our mail, and nothing but our mail.
What’s also fun is the little tidbits I’ve learned about his life. He is, I swear, using a speaker phone/headphone rig at least 95% of the time. I can hear him and current conversationee from the moment he gets out of his truck, walks up to our door, back down to his truck until the sound of his engine restarting. Maybe about 50 seconds each time? You’d be surprised at how much you can learn in that time.
Great job for someone who LOVES to chat on the phone.
While I like a well-crafted neologism as much as the next guy, there IS such a thing as “too much of a good thing.” The word you want is interlocutor.
Thanks for this! I had informed delivery, but earlier this year it stopped working. I keep meaning to check it out, but you made it easy. So, thanks. Damn, I’m lazy.
Speaking of informed delivery, I’m reminded of something that’s been bugging me about it. Every so often the email includes what appears to be some sort of Postal Service information. It looks like it’s supposed to be something that will be in my mailbox, except it never is. I’m not sure if for some reason my carrier isn’t bothering to deliver these, or what.
Same. I finally decided the E-version of the mail piece was the only one; there is no hard copy. That’s 100% surmise on my part but so far ~6 months its been 100% accurate.
Unlike a pic of an advertising flyer, we see the wholebghing, not just the face w an address.
I was beginning to think the same thing, as my carrier is pretty good about getting me all of my mail.
Also, I have a number of subscriptions and none of the magazines are ever included in the email, but are put in my mailbox. I guess they’re a separate delivery system.