Ask a Mailman (City Letter Carrier) anything

1236 Questions

Last Answer on February 18, 2022

Have you eved had to call 911 while on the job

Asked by Mat over 5 years ago

Fortunately, no. I believe if I were involved in a motor vehicle accident, I’d first call my supervisor, and then call 911 (unless there were apparent injuries or fire where we would call 911 first).

179 Votes

Do you have CB radios

Asked by Gentlemen almost 5 years ago

The tractor trailers may have some type of radio communications, but as a letter carrier, I do not. We just have our personal cell phones and our intelligent mail device (handheld scanner) which can be used to communicate with the office. We rarely use that option. Mostly it’s phone calls or regular text messaging to communicate with each other (either carrier to carrier or carrier to mgmt).

178 Votes

Is there any condition besides a hurricane or wild fire or floods that they would say “okay don’t go out today”?

Asked by Micah about 5 years ago

There aren’t too many that I can think of where we wouldn’t go out on our routes. I believe if there was extreme cold and wind chill conditions or a snowfall that made the roads impasssable, the mgmt may decide to suspend delivery of mail for the day. I don’t keep track, but, in my career, mail delivery has only been canceled on a few occasions. The LLV that many of us use for delivery don’t handle well when snow has accumulated more than a few inches on a road. It is even worse on an incline or decline.

177 Votes

But it’s important

Asked by RED ALERT about 5 years ago

How is it important to the Letter Carrier blog?

175 Votes

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What’s your IQ

Asked by Big Jim about 5 years ago

I have no idea but consider myself intelligent.

173 Votes

What do you think of this?
https://youtu.be/dplvOCL2N54

Asked by Dan about 5 years ago

Dan, I watched the video and it was pretty well done.i don’t know if it’s your video or you are just referencing it. It keeps referring to the postal inspecting service but it is the postal inspection service. They are somewhat thinly staffed so I don’t know how much they will investigate this particular case but I know what you talk about and it is definitely an issue. The same thing sometimes happens in my office where if some Amazon parcels happen to not get delivered there is a scan that is put on such as “no access” or business closed” that will “stop the clock”. It definitely is a false event scan if we just happened to forget the package at our office or forget to deliver it and it would be too far to go back and deliver it. I have no idea what the financial agreement is between the United States Postal Service and Amazon but we try to make sure each package that we get every day from Amazon is delivered that same day. The quality and quantity of the employees at each office varies greatly. I take a lot of pride in my work so I try to make sure each package is delivered each day for my postal route. There is definitely a falsification of scans where it says delivery has been “attempted” and it really hasn’t. I don’t know the solution to it except more public outcry and exposure. I will not be a whistleblower, however, because I would be concerned any retaliation for this. I don’t believe I’ve ever falsified and Amazon delivery scan.

173 Votes

Do you liesten to the radio in your mail truck? If so what do you listen to?

Asked by Toooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmiiiiiiieeee about 5 years ago

The particular vehicle that I have is not equipped with a radio. Most of the day I am out delivering on foot. I have an iPhone where I listen to podcasts via a Bluetooth earpiece but only make sure one ear is covered up. We are probably not even supposed to be able to do that. I think I would find the day really boring if I couldn’t listen to anything. The route I deliver is entirely residential so I don’t see that many people during the day. I don’t really listen to any music during the day but I do listen to podcasts sometimes. The subject matter is usually history or aviation. Thanks for writing.

171 Votes