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.
I think many letter carriers would just leave it because they may notice right away that there is no address on it or stamp. I can't speak for all letter carriers because there are many of us who don't pay attention and just take what's in the mailbox as outgoing mail. I don't think this good for them to do but some of my co-workers are clueless or are possibly paying attention to their smart phone vs. paying attention to the task at hand. To be honest, the mailbox should only be used for US Mail. My advice would be to not leave this letter in someone's mailbox to guard against the above scenario happening. To sum up my answer in one word: maybe.
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Not often. I deliver the same route each day, so I pretty much know when residents move in or out. I deliver mail in an upper middle class community and there aren't many rentals and most houses are occupied. If mail begins to accumulate for awhile and I don't see any activity at the house and the grounds start to look more unkempt I may suspect a house is vacant. When most people move, they submit a change of address/forwarding order. This also gives me an indication that if I don't see a new residents name that the house could be vacant. At present, about 1% of the houses on my route are considered vacant and don't receive mail delivery. I'm sure in many other communities that aren't as well off economically there could be more vacant homes.
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Asking me and other letter carriers will likely get you 2 different answers. I think it's great to get the smartpost and surePost parcels to deliver alongside our regular mail. I view it as more business for the USPS, my employer. If my employer can get more business that would hopefully translate as better for the workers. I don't find it an annoyance whatsoever and know it's part of my job. If the volume of parcels gets too high I would possibly take longer to complete my route which translates into overtime pay which would be beneficial. The volume of parcels that I deliver is not overwhelming except around the holiday season. Amazon uses the USPS as well as other delivery companies to complete their delivery fulfillment. There are some coworkers who don't want to do any extra work and complain about everything so the extra parcels would annoy them. I feel they are close-minded and lazy. In so many cases I don't see the importance of US Mail nowadays with regards to financial statements and bills. That has been able to be done electronically for so many years now. Parcels are what our business should be happy to be delivering. Don't ever feel bad about ordering too much online. I know I wouldn't.
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I don't think that the letter carrier should be giving the mail to the woman who moved out just because he knows her personally. If the woman didn't put in a proper change of address request with the USPS, then it is appropriate for the mail to be returned to sender with an endorsement by the USPS saying "unable to forward" or "moved, left no address". I wouldn't get involved with anyone's mail based on my relationship of knowing them. Fortunately, it's rare that I'm ever asked to do anything that is questionable regarding the mail. As far as your question goes, I don't know that the mailman is allowed to do what he is doing, but it doesn't seem right.
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Generally that would be correct. If the PO is closed due to poor weather conditions it would usually mean our whole retail and delivery operations have been suspended. I don't know if there are still processing operations going on at the mail plants. It isn't too common for us to suspend delivery for an entire day, but in blizzards or states of emergency, it could be necessary for us to do so.
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I don't think you will be in trouble. Lisa, in my experience your mail should be processed normally so you need not worry. I don't often collect mail from the blue boxes as part of my assignment but if I saw regular mail in the Express Priority Blue Box I'd just put it with other outgoing mail in my postal vehicle and it'd be treated normally. I've never heard of outgoing mail being delayed by this. Thank you for your question.
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I'm not sure why you have recently started getting standard mail addressed to a tenant from 5 years ago. It's possible that name and address was on somebody's mailing list which was then sold to other companies/organizations. One option is to put the mail back in the mailstream or mailbox and write "person doesn't live here" on the envelope. A conscientious letter carrier would make note of it and only deliver mail addressed to you (the current tenant). Another option is to just discard/recycle the unwanted mail. Most standard mail doesn't get returned to the sender if unwanted by the recipient. We put it into a big recycle bin at work and I think it gets shipped off to a processing or recycling facility. The rate a mailer pays for standard mail usually doesn't include any type of address or return service to notify them of outdated names on their mailing lists.
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