Mailman (City Letter Carrier)

Mailman (City Letter Carrier)

MailmanDave

17 Years Experience

Long Island, NY

Male, 43

I am a City Letter Carrier for the US Postal Service in NY. I've been a city letter carrier for over 17 years and it is the best job I've ever had. I mostly work 5 days per week (sometimes includes a Saturday) and often have the opportunity for overtime, which is usually voluntary. The route I deliver has about 350 homes and I walk to each of their doors to deliver the mail. Please keep in mind that I don't have authority to speak for the USPS, so all opinions are solely mine, not my employer.

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1237 Questions

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Last Answer on February 18, 2022

Best Rated

if someone moves and don't put a fwd what should i do with there mail

Asked by china over 10 years ago

I'd recommend that if you received the mail for someone who previously lived at your residence but didn't put in a forward for you to put the mail back in your mailbox and you can write on it "moved" or "doesn't live here anymore". The letter carrier should take it and not redeliver it to you. You also have the option to discard since nobody would really know but I feel that is the wrong thing to do. By putting the mail back in the mailbox you alert the letter carrier that the person has moved from that address.

582 Votes

Can I stop receiving letters from a particular sender?

Asked by Lois over 10 years ago

I am not sure if you can. An option is to contact the sender by phone or another means and request to not be sent any mail. If the mail is First class you can write "refused" on the envelope and it will be returned to the sender. Generally any mail that is sent as Presorted Standard (bulk mail) will just get discarded at the local PO if you write "refused" on the mail. The sender would never know you didn't want that mail. I'd just recommend that you discard/recycle any mail you don't want. For the most part customers I deliver mail to don't refuse many letters and probably just throw away anything they don't want. If they give it back to me I handle it as above (either discard the PO where I work or return it to the sender).

582 Votes

I am in carrier orientation. I was told if I don't deliver mail on time that has a time guarantee my pay will be docked. Is this true?

Asked by Diane about 10 years ago

I've never heard of your pay getting docked for not delivering mail on time. I think only Express Mail (aka Priority Mail Express) does have a delivery time guarantee and the sender can request a refund if that commitment isn't met. We can get disciplined at our office (letter of warning/suspension/termination) if we fail to deliver a time guarantee mail item, but I've rarely ever heard of anyone getting anything beyond a warning for this. This type of mail is a premium service so we must give it our utmost attention and care. Good luck in orientation. Here is just a life lesson in general: Don't believe everything you hear. I'm a big skeptic in so much I hear at work unless a reliable source. I actually might annoy people because I believe so little at times.

582 Votes

I ordered an item on Ebay which was to be sent from China to Canada. After being over due I checked my Ebay invoice and discovered I spelled Churchill as Churchhill. Everything else being correct is that typo enough to cause delivery problems.

Asked by Dan over 10 years ago

Your typo of putting Churchhill instead of Churchill on the eBay order shouldn't cause any delivery issues. Items mailed often have spelling errors and typos. As long as the postal service personnel can figure out what was meant by the mailer or be able to decipher unclear handwriting, the item will usually be delivered properly. The delay in the delivery is probably for another reason, but I don't know what that is. I presume the item wasn't sent with any tracking number or that would be able to provide you with some more guidance as to where the item is.

581 Votes

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I got a voicemail saying "This is your mailman, I've got certified mail for. Are you home?" I live in an apartment complex. How did the mailman get my phone number?

Asked by Asmabone1 over 10 years ago

It's pretty rare but sometimes a phone number is printed on the outside of the envelope. I've never heard of a mailman calling a customer to tell him about a certified letter but that doesn't mean it can't happen. If we can't deliver a certified letter the normal procedure is to leave a form called a PS 3849 in your mail receptacle informing you of our delivery attempt and how to go about receiving the certified letter. If I were you I'd ignore the VM unless they were very specific and it's something you were expecting. They also could have looked up your phone number but it's not part of our normal procedure and if it was a mobile # it wouldn't show up on any directory.

581 Votes

Have you ever had to sign someone's name for them on a package because they weren't home? and also is there any way that doing this can screw over the customer?

Asked by Fern over 10 years ago

I sign customer's names on accountable mail or packages that need a signature if I know them and they'd likely want that done. I frequently do this but technically it's not allowed unless the recipient has given previous written authorization to do this. So far, it's never been a problem in my career that I've signed for an item, but I don't expect others to do the same. As far as if this can screw over a customer, I don't know. I suppose if you signed for a package for a customer and then never delivered it to them it could be a problem. I think in that case the letter carrier would be questioned because the intended recipient never received the item and will say it's not their signature on the PS 3849 or electronic signature record.

581 Votes

The mailman just knocked on our door and asked my name and I said yes that's me. He did not give me anything he only said the form he was holding was for him to report something and he left. Now I'm worried what it was he needed to report?

Asked by Michael Peterson over 10 years ago

Thanks for your question. We do sometimes get requests from attorneys or collection agencies or process servers which ask us to verify if a certain name received mail at a certain address. I don't know what the form is called but I believe this is legal as long as the proper procedures are followed by the requesting party. They will also ask if they have moved and, if so, what is the new address for the person in question. I receive these forms not too often. If I do get this written request, I just tell the registry clerk or supervisor what the status is of that name because I pretty much know all the names of people who receive mail on my postal route. As far as I know it's usually for a legal matter or debt recovery issue.

581 Votes

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