Serious Venting

[More Minis Dollhouses]

I am so tired of dealing with USPS's incompetance that Im fed up with them. I have been waiting for a package from HBS so I can finish my Haunted House and I was so happy that it would get here today so I could finish it tomorrow but it was FAILURE as usual with USPS.

I always sign up for email notification and they send me the emails hours later or not at all to update me on my package and even though the delivery was scheduled for today, I thought it was kind of funny that I wasnt notified of its arrival but fine. I let it go. Now I get an email saying the package was delivered and it wasnt. I havent recieved anything. Lord only knows who has my package. ^_^

Now I had to email HBS to let them know and they wont be able to do anything until tomorrow which means they will most likely resend my package through the same #^%#$% service and I have to wait four more days for it.

Everytime Ive had things sent through USPS theres been a problem of some sort. One time my package was sent to some other zip code, many times they just never come to me and have to be resent and now this. Companies should give people the option of who makes the deliveries. I will pay extra, anything, to get correct service. This is rediculous. I hate it when HBS send through USPS and they do it automatic, theres nothng you can do about it. They chose the delivery service for you. I guess they only use UPS or Fedex when your order is more than a certain dollar amount. Im raging mad...

[Minis On The Edge]

I have the same problem here. I am told it is because we are a small town......We have almost 20,000 people here in our town, it's NOT small anymore. I have complained. I get my neighbors mail (Credit cards and bills all). It is a shame.

[PATBIDLACK]

I'm disabled (bum knee) and of coarse it takes a lot to open the door but I swear those guys are the fasts runners in the country. They ring the bell, throw the package down and run for their truck.

[Esther]

Did you check all around your house? I've found packages in the most unlikely places...behind bushes, behind the Herby Curby, on the back side of our pop-up camper, etc. It might be there somewhere. Sometimes you just have to hunt. a lot.

[uppitycats]

Did you make this common mistake, too? When you get an email notification that the package has been "delivered" .. all that REALLY means is this: It's been delivered to your local postal station, not specifically to your mailbox, or address. You might wait until the next delivery day (presumably today) and see if it doesn't actually show up at your door, before you start demanding that it be resent.

[Wolfie]

We can't even get any UPS deliveries from mid-October until May of the following year! We have to have the packages sent to either our local market who wil accept packages or to a friend's house down in the actual town of Seeley. Very inconvenient. And yes, when they do come it's slam, bam, thank you mam and off they go! What ever happened to signing for things? Fed-Ex is the same way........oh if you're lucky and the dog barks when they are coming up the drive you can rush outside and "greet" them.....but in most cases they pull up, throw the box on the deck, and off they go. One day we were lucky to get them as there were supposed to be three packages on the truck - and they only brought us two...we asked them to check and sure enough the other package was there. Rude? You betcha they are!

Sign me UN-enchanted with both UPS and Fed-Ex

[Intrinsicat]

My aunt works for the USPS. My brother shared a dilemma with her a friend of his was experiencing. Apparently his friend's USPS driver is a fat, lazy cow who won't get out of her truck for anything. Consequently, if she has a package, she won't deliver it to the door like she is supposed to. Instead, she leaves it on the ground in front of the community mailbox. He's just waiting for something important to go missing or get damaged. They ARE supposed to take it up to the door.

Her advice was to go over the heads of the local USPS location because it's usually a pretty tight-knit group. Find out what city your branch office is affiliated with. For instance, my brother's friend lives in Germantown, MD but the main office location is Baltimore. Get THAT address and write a scathing letter about the incompetence of the postal carrier, siting specific examples, dates even. Apparently it doesn't take much in the way of being a squeaky wheel to get upper management to jump all over a local branch.

But I'd take Uppittycats advice as wel, and maybe place a call to the local post office today to confirm that they have received the package because you've received that email.

[More Minis Dollhouses]

Theres no where to hide the package around my house. I live in a condo/townhouse. My front door is facing a common balcony/hallway. My house has no back side because I live on the second and third floor. They always put these type of packages in a locker style mailbox with a key by our own mailboxes. They dont come to the door with them.

I always use the email notification to avoid walking to my mailbox, which is kind of far, for no reason. When it arrives at my local post office it only says "arrival at unit" with my zip code but when its in my mailbox, it says "delivered" and thats what it says. I just got an email from HBS saying it was delivered as well. Well, it wasnt delivered to me.

Im hoping that whoever got it by mistake will knock on my door today to give me the package but its highly unlikely since this is Miami and its not known for neighborly love. They probably kept it or tossed it out so they wouldnt have to find my townhouse number. Since all the mailboxes are together, they keep getting mail in the wrong boxes. They dont focus. Ive gotten all sorts of stuff from other people but I always walk around and find their house to give it to them.

Unbelievable.

[texasbuilder]

Yikes. What a tangled web. I live in Dallas and the mail carrier has certain rules she must follow: don't back up; if the box is blocked she doesn't have to deliver the mail; put bulky items on the porch; shut off the motor whenever leaving the mail truck. She follows these rules exactly and applies them the same to everyone.

Now we do have a problem caused by the city. I live on North XXX Street. There is another street with the same name but it is South XXX street. Both streets have the same set of house numbers. I can't tell you how many times my mail has been left at the wrong address. A neighbor had the same problem and found out about it when their electric was shut off for failure to pay. The mail had been going to the wrong address and that person just dumped it. I know, they had to have known they hadn't paid the power bill and I agree. This usually happens when a substitute carrier is on the route.

Once about two years ago a Spanish language newspaper was delivered to my house everyday. It took weeks to get it cut off. The newspaper just wouldn't believe that I didn't order it.

[SallyG]

The USPS.....<groan>

What really fries me is when there is a package to be signed for and a car is in the driveway (obviously someone is home!), instead of lifting her butt out of the car and coming up the extremely short sidewalk to the back door, knocking on the door, and letting someone sign for and receive the package....does she do that?...noooooooo....she takes the time to fill out one of those little cards telling me there is a package for me at the post office, what time I can pick it up the next day, etc...and puts it in the mailbox. In that length of time she could have hauled her butt to the door, delivered the package, and been on her way! 

I have to make an extra trip out the next day to the post office and stand in line to get the package, which SHOULD have been delivered to my house the day BEFORE!!!

The problem is, she just does not want to get out of the car to deliver the package!!

[uppitycats]

I live in rural Wisconsin. Whoever named the roads around here had no imagination. There are just a few names, but they all have a "direction" before them...N/W/S/E...

but even with that, I rarely have any problem with USPS deliveries. We have a mailbox on the road, and if the box is small enough, it gets stuffed in there. Otherwise the guy (or sometimes gal) comes up our 1200 foot driveway, honking the horn to let me know they're coming, with packages and the rest of the mail.

If our mailbox gets full -- like, if my husband is away and I haven't gotten to the mail box -- they'll clean it out and bring it up, and check to see if I'm OK.

They'll call and let us know that a BIG package is at the post office in town, if we're coming in, and want to pick it up.

And so on. So no problems here. Only got alarmed once when all the mail delivered to the row of boxes got moved one box ahead...so my husband went down to the row, shifted everything (no, they're not locked, open for anyone to get in to) and that solved that. Turns out there was a substitute and he just missed.

If it DID get delivered to your condo and a neighbor picked it up..that's not the fault of the postal service. Is the large locked package box "keyed" just to you, or can anyone get access to it?

[grazhina]

A lot depends on where you live. So far I've been doing well with the priority mail packages I send out. I've been hearing from customers that they've often been arriving 2 days after I send them out. Keeping fingers crossed. Only one customer wrote to ask where her shipment was. It turned out it was in her post office waiting for her for almost 3 weeks. She gave them hell for that.

Some years ago we had a problem with a couple of letters that we sent out that never arrived at their destination, one held a check, another concert tickets. We notified the postmaster when the letter with the check got lost. We were then contacted by the central post office in DC, they mounted an investigation. They even called us a couple of times later to check and see how our mail delivery was working out.

I have noticed that substitute mail carriers will often not be the most diligent of workers.

We had a mailman once who just decided not to deliver mail, I guess. This was in another town in western PA. we got less and less mail then noticed we had days with no mail at all. In this day of junk mail overflowing mailboxes that's unusual. We found out other neighbors had the same complaint and the PO got a bunch of calls. Suddenly we had a new mailman and the mail was being delivered at 9AM instead of late afternoon.

One more story, this one deals with UPS. I had sent my mom a large box for Christmas, and called her a few days later to make sure she got it. She said she hadn't. I checked tracking and it said it had been delivered. I was concerned, thinking it may have been stolen off her front porch. She called me back later to say she had found it. The UPS guy had tucked it under her back steps where it had sat for 2 days.

[More Minis Dollhouses]

If it DID get delivered to your condo and a neighbor picked it up..that's not the fault of the postal service. Is the large locked package box "keyed" just to you, or can anyone get access to it?

The locker has a key and when the postal person leaves a package in it, they lock it and the key is placed in your mailbox so you can open it to get your package. All the mailboxes are locked and each owner has the key to their mailbox. Everything is keyed and locked in this city. This is a very urban area. No one has access to anyone elses mailbox unless they break the lock.

They obviously put the locker key in someone elses mailbox because it wasnt in mines and no one that lives around here has come to the door to give me the package yet so who knows what happened.

[heidiiiii]

It has been many years since I delivered mail. The only difference from then to now is that they have those hand held machines that swipe the code off the package they are delivering.

When it came to rural delivery, we had a few options. If the package was small enough to fit in the mailbox or be hung from the mailbox with rubber bands (i swear that is what we were taught), then that is what we did. If the package was larger, we had to go to the door. If no one was home and we could leave it (not a signed for package) we left it on the front porch..if the weather was inclement then we left a note so the package wouldnt get ruined. When it came to apartment complexes with a big shared mailbox area, we did not leave it because it could be stolen. We went to the apartment, if no one was home..we left a notice.

If I know the package is in the post office tomorrow for instance and I really want it right now..(ROFL) I have gone at 8am to the P.O. and they have given it to me. I say (lie) that I was going in this direction and it will give you one less package to deliver. If you want to go this route, try to find out when they leave for their route in the morning. In the city, they leave at 9:30am..so I get there an hour beforehand.

A lil sugar gets you a long way too. Not saying you have to bribe your postal worker but if you get to know them you can usually give them heads up about a package that is coming, or a check that you are dying for.

But like I said, I live in the city. Much different then rural route delivery.

[christinee]

Gina, I'm sorry for your missing package. Hopefully HBS can send out a replacement while the missing package is tracked down!

I've been fortunate with the mail service in our new place. I'm sure it has to do with the fact that we are in a very rural area that's very similar to Uppitycats area. The mail lady is really nice and if we have several packages that won't fit in the mailboxes, she'll drive down our VERY long driveway and honk the horn. Usually I see her coming down the driveway so I can meet her. We have dogs outside so I think she's apprehensive to get out with the dogs (which I can understand). If our mailbox is full she'll come and deliver our mail also. It helps, I think, that the mailboxes are directly across from our property.

The only time we don't get packages is when there's a substitute. Then they leave the slip if the box won't fit in the mailbox. And when there's a sub, sometimes my newspaper never gets delivered or our neighbor gets it.

When I lived in the Ft. Lauderdale area, the mail there was a HUGE pain in the youknowwhat. I remember years ago when I had a mail order beaniebaby/gift business, I argued not once, but TWICE with the postal clerk whlie shipping packages whether Alaska AND Hawaii are in the United States. This clerk INSISTED that I MUST ship the packages internationally because Alaska and Hawaii are NOT in the United States.

The scariest part is that NONE of the other clerks bothered to correct him. It wasn't until about 20 people in line behind me got tired of the arguement and told the clerk to go back to school and take a geography lesson. He finally let me ship the packages priority mail with a stern warning that they WILL be returned to me for incorrect shipping method. ROFLMAO They got to their destination in 3 days successfully.

[More Minis Dollhouses]

Well, I decided to leave a note to the postal worker. I told them that the key for the locker of the package they delivered yesterday was misplaced in someone elses mailbox and I would really be thankful if they could try and find it and put it in my mailbox. I told them that no one had brought me the package so theres a possibility its still in the mailbox because they havent checked their mail yet. Lets see what happens. It might work.

I felt kind of bummed though because when I got to my mailbox a locker had the key on the door. That means someone opened it and took a package. Could be theirs but it could also be the one Im missing. Sigh....no one has come to give it to me if it was mines.

Short of knocking on all 900 units that make up this gated community, Ill have to wait and see if the post man can help.

[texasbuilder]

Hey Christine. I met your postal worker's cousin the other day. I was billed too much for a subscription to the Seattle PI newspaper (for a family member in Seattle) and called to find out why. The woman very indignantly told me the problem was there was 5 weeks in a month. I said I don't know where you went to school but there are only 4 weeks in a month now, before, forever. She told me I was wrong and that I had to pay for a 5 week month. When I asked to speak to a supervisor she hung up on me. I don't give up easily so called back and got a supervisor on the phone and he listened to what I had to say and then told me that the Seattle PI bills on a five week cycle and the due date is different every month. When he told me that his clerk was correct and that I just didn't understand her that is when I cancelled the subscription. I now see what they are doing since every month has a different amount of days this way they can essentially get you for every day in the month. I have other things I would rather spend my money on.

[havanaholly]

The USPS has lost packages that Tracy & I tried to send each other, so I hate to send anything through the mail any more.

[Wolfie]

Our post office is so small that our ladies there know everyone in town, but occasionally we got other mail in our box and usually I just take it to the window and they put it where it belongs. They are super people to deal with for such a tiny town. But UPS has delivered our packages to others, who usually call us and tell us they have it and we go and get the packages, or they refuse to deliver to us because we are so rural. Usually we cannot get service via UPS or Fed-Ex or anyone else from the end of October until May 1st. We do not get floral deliveries either.......no one will come up here, 6000 feet, narrow dirt road with a cliff on one side, no lights, no guardrails, slipper as anything in the winter, and hazardous. We have studded snows but the delivery people don't even have chains. So we have our packages delivered to a friend downtown in Seeley or the supermarket will accept packages. Even the post office accepts delivery of Fed-Ex and/or UPS.

You are not alone with mail problems.......

[Debra from Olde Cape Cod]

This happened years ago, but definitely was a ray of sunshine. We lived in Kodiak, Alaska and I mailed an order to the Dollhouse Factory in New Jersey. Three days later I received my package! From the USPS no less. The elves must have really worked overtime that time. Debra