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.
It is rare that I come across anything sketchy in my deliveries. Two events come to mind. During the anthrax scare not long after 09/11/01, I thought I may have come across mail which had some powdery substance coming out of it. My memory is pretty poor of what the item looked like and who it was addressed to. Anyhow, I may have had some psychosomatic reaction and had trouble breathing and was very nervous. I don’t remember reporting it and the symptoms didn’t last at all. Fortunately, the anthrax scare was short-lived. The other incident was just items addressed to “pervert Pete” or “sexually wet babies”. Both are kind of disgusting to me. The items addresses to “sexually wet babies” I delivered because maybe the recipient had a company or something related to that name. Eventually, the resident gave them back to me and said she doesn’t know of that name. Her son was kind of sketchy so I thought the letters would be for him. As far as “pervert Pete” I didn’t deliver that mail because I knew the resident and there was nobody accepting mail there by that name. In general, it’s not for us to judge what is mailed to people and we rcv no guidance from management about too much unless a liquid or strange odor is coming from a package. Fortunately all of those situations happen rarely. Thanks for your question.
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Definitely not, KDS4444. Restricted Delivery service is very specific that the signator be the addressee and nobody else. We may not release the letter unless we have positively identified that the named addressee is the person signing for the letter. This is the service that the mailer has specifically requested. In my entire career, I can probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve had a restricted delivery item to attempt. I don’t know if it’s more common for you. I recommend not fabricating anything when attempting to deliver a Restricted Delivery item. I’d leave a PS3849 if the named addressee isn’t available to sign for the item. Thank you for your question.
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Hello Dee. I guess you are a CCA. I see from your post that you are working quite a bit. 26 days straight does seem excessive even though it's Christmas month and it's busy with parcel deliveries and more. I don't know the rules as to how many days in a row a CCA can be scheduled to work. In my office it seems they max out at about 13 days in a row, but I don't know if it's a rule or not. If there is an NALC steward in your office, you may ask them. Furthermore, the nalc.org website should have some q and a for CCA which may address your question.
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We deliver mail to retail stores all of the time. For the most part, the USPS delivers mail to every address in the country. I understand your question is about having it sent to an individual at the store. The letter would be delivered with all of the other mail for the day for that business. It’d be up to the business itself to get the letter to the intended recipient and that may be difficult especially in a large store
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Matt, I'm a city letter carrier so I believe we have different work rules and leave usage policies. I don't know how it works for rural route carriers and working on your scheduled day off for extra pay. It doesn't seem to me that rural route carriers get paid OT or extra days pay too often in my office, but again I admit I'm not familiar with the rules that govern rural routes. You could contact a union rep from the NRLCA and maybe they can give you that info or even ask your supervisor or manager. As a city carrier this scenario happens all of the time. A city carrier will request a vacation day and then another city carrier will work on their scheduled day off for a minimum of 8 hrs OT pay.
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It should be a very straightforward process as to who is awarded an assignment. Seniority is usually the main determining factor. In your case I don't know why they would say you won the bid and then later say someone higher in seniority bid for it. I would ask to see evidence of the bid and that it was submitted in time by the person with more seniority than you. I've never seen this conflict happen before where I work. If you can bid for other offices in your city I thought the process was fully automated. I am not sure what advice to give you. A union shop steward may be able to help you but maybe they are involved in person with higher seniority get assigned to the route that you got.
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I don't think it's appropriate to leave packages on a sidewalk under a mailbox. I was taught that if it didn't fit in a mailbox to bring it to the front door/porch. As to whether or not it's common, I'd hope not. I do work with some lazy people so it wouldn't surprise me if this happened every now and then by some of my co-workers. We are paid by the hour so if it takes us longer to go to a door to deliver a package we are getting paid more theoretically. The only protocol that I'm aware of is that packages should be left in a safe location. It may be subjective as to what one considers safe. I'd recommend contacting your local post office and mention to a delivery supervisor or manager that you don't like packages being left on the sidewalk if they won't fit into your mailbox. You may request that the items be brought to your front door/porch. I don't know if this will solve your problem but it's worth a try. Thanks for your question.
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