[venting]

I didn't receive mail since Tuesday last week. Prior to Tuesday, I didn't get mail for a few days either. I figured it was odd, but there have been 2 days in a row in which I didn't get mail before, so I didn't think too much of it.... until Saturday.

You see, DirecTV is sending new access cards out to all customers to fight piracy. My DirecTV receivers know that I should have gotten the new access cards and were starting to warn me. I called DirecTV on Saturday and they said they sent my cards out the 15th, so obviously my mail was getting screwed up.

I went down to the PO today to complain. After waiting in line and hearing the teller explain to everybody in front of me that she was harassed at Shop Rite this weekend, I asked where my mail was. It turns out that my postman (the guy that drops my mail in my mailbox) decided that I was no longer living in my appartment. I'm glad he did that, and I'm glad there is no protocol for checking to see if I had actually abandoned that place. The teller asked me for ID to cancel the hold on my mail. Isn't that assinine? My postman, someone I have never met, can tell them that I moved, but I can't tell them that I still live there without showing my driver's license?!?!?!

Now, the other interesting part of the story is that I got mail on Tuesday (Oct 22). So, this illustrates that if I had moved they can't even hold mail properly! And Tuesday's mail was mostly credit card statements! I'm sorry if you work for the post office, but your organization is a bunch of morons.

By the way, this is Pomona, NY 10970's PO. My sister is dating the postmaster's son, so maybe I can talk to him about this.

[/venting]

Any ideas what led him to believe you no longer lived there?

In a related story, on Saturday, I started recieving mail for someone I've never heard of. Not too unususal, right? Somehow a name and address gets screwed up in a database somewhere. But, in this case, it had an address listed on it that wasn't mine which had been crossed out and my address written in by the post office. So, somehow, they decided that someone else now lives where I do. At least I didn't stop getting mail actually addressed to me. I think.

Any ideas what led him to believe you no longer lived there?

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that....
I am selling my place, so there is a lock box on the door. That's it. Surely this guy must have seen a lock box before. I don't know how you get "this person doesn't live here" from a lock box being on the door knob.

Had that happen to me in my previous appartment at least 2-3 times a year. They would even send things back to the sender and I would only find out when trying to use a credit card online and it got rejected because the billing address was 'incorrect'. Or when HR forwarded bounced mail to my office with a request to update my 'new address' in their databases.

I dunno, I'd think it would have been best if he tried to ask you - but I certainly can see how he'd take that to mean you weren't there - evicted or otherwise. I could see the same situation turn out differently somewhere else, where a lock was on a door and the person should not have gotten their mail. I guess I'm just saying - you shouldn't be that surprised really...

I certainly can see how he'd take that to mean you weren't there - evicted or otherwise

BAH! If no one entered a forwarding request and the mail has not piled up, he shouldn't "assume" anything other than business as usual.

My father was a postman for 20 years, he used to go to work at 4AM and was home by 3PM, our mail was in the box by 10AM, noon at the latest (not his route,) but not anymore. It's a miracle if it's in the box by 3PM, and if it's really my mail or the guy that lived here over 7 years ago. I need a rubber stamp that says "NOT AT THIS ADDRESS."

Nah. It's not just you. I get that over here in the UK.
I'd been in all day waiting for a package and it never arrived. I give it an extra day just in case it gets delayed. Call up the supplier and find out that somehow it got sent back with "No longer living here" stamped on it.

I'm just wondering who said that if it even got to the right address since it was just me in all day. Or where the postman decided I now lived. It's especially strange since I've been living here for the past few years and had loads of packages before and since!

- Trevor

I had UPS do the same to me here. I was waiting for car parts, and was watching the tracking page every day. Somehow they made it all the way to Minneapolis and were then re-routed back to California at the last minute. According to their records, I was deceased! They went the SLOW way back to the vendor and then to me again - by bulk cargo on a train. It took about three weeks to get my next day air parts... No company is immune to it I guess.

Talk about a bad experience with shipping companies.... I JUST got my turntables that I had my parents send down to me... Guess what... EVERYTHING was broken except for my headphones. Somehow they managed to break the latches on the heavy duty coffin.. then the coffin opened letting everything inside loose. Now im left with everything smashed together including the audio jacks (smashed into the turntables) and the styli all bent.... The best part is that when I called to claim the insurance they said they have 1 (one) person for the miami/homestead aread for claims. So in a week when he has time to get to me, he will stop by and check the damages. If it "qualifies" for a claim then I will have to get my parents to fill out a bunch of paper work, get all the receipts somehow and then I will get a check anywhere from 2 weeks to a month later... What I was thinking was; what happened if I had a show or something and I really needed this stuff?... So far I havn't had this much trouble with a shipping company. Even my lost usps packages find thier way home in acceptable condition. Theres more to the story but I havn't completly lost hope so I'll save it for another day... lets just say some of the employee's that I talked to weren't too friendly.

Sorry,, had to rant somewhere..

-Greg

I once worked for a jewelry store that had to make a claim on UPS "losing" one of a group of four packages with some pretty expensive diamonds in each.

Normally, we used USPS insured/certified and never had any trouble. But in this case, the distributor needed his diamonds back really fast so we took a chance with UPS overnight.

We had carefully tracked and recorded exactly what went into each package, and insured each one for the exact amount of the value of the merchandise. The reason we had to split it into four packages was because of UPS's insurance limits at the time.

They actually paid up in a reasonable amount of time. Our distributor was happy, it was his biggest sale of the year. He encouraged us to use UPS more often.

The postal service is sooo slow, the garden seeds I ordered six months ago arrived a a bouquet!
boom tish


thank you, you're a great audience, I'm here all week. Try the veal.

Someone got a very nice present that christmas, I bet...

Worth remembering that 'lost' packages are a euphemism for 'stolen'.

My dad used to work for a large shipping company in the UK, and the stories he'd come back with from being a manager there were horrendous. The guys who drove the vans (and yes they were all blokes) were the most stupid bunch of theiving morons I've ever heard of (assuming all the stories were true).

Cheers,

Paul.

I know somebody that had a big equipment rack shipped which just disappearred for a month. It turns out they some how lost the shipping documents and this massive crate just sat in the shipping depot for about a month until somebody wondered what it actually was...

- Trevor