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.
Larry, congratulations on becoming a CCA for the USPS. It's not an easy position of being given different assignments daily that you possibly aren't familiar with and expected to perform like you are. I don't know of a trick to organizing the mail, but I'll explain what I do. Regarding the mail, when you pull it down from the carrier case, you may want to number the trays in delivery order and then load them in reverse order to the back of the truck. Put the highest numbered trays towards the back of the cargo area (closest to the driver) and the lowered numbered trays towards the liftgate in the cargo area. This is assuming you are driving an LLV and are on a walking route (park and loop). With regards to parcels, if they are small enough to be put in plastic trays, you may line them up in delivery order or at least keep ones of the same street together. For larger parcels I try to load them in by street (or section of street). I make it sound easy, but a large part of that is because I deliver the same route each day. If it was a new route, I would probably just keep the parcels together by street name. I understand that a lot of what I'm telling you is easier said than done, and with time you should become more efficient and familiar with the routes in your office. Be patient and work safely. Thanks for your question and it will be worth the wait to become a regular carrier.
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Mischa, I deleted one of your questions because it came up as a duplicate on this website. When we return from our routes, we put all of the outgoing (collected) mail in a dispatch area usually divided into flat, letters, parcels, priority, metered, stamped, etc. With regards to the prepaid shipping labels which is usually called Parcel Select Return Service I put the item in a separate area and our dispatch clerk knows what to do with it. I don't know when it is scanned at our post office. I would suspect that the package would be scanned at least in 1-2 days. Some packages which are being sent back as a return are transported by a 3rd party company that picks up those packages at our post office. Other packages are transported by the USPS back to the company where the package is being returned. I know when I pick it up from a customer as an outgoing return package I do not scan the item at all. I hope this helps but please keep checking USPS.com to track your package for any scans.
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I remember your question about having tickets delivered to your neighbors and asking if you could ask the mailman to deliver them your house or some type of favor. I am rarely asked for any type of favor like that and I think if I heard a request like yours that may sound a bit fishy I would decline to get involved. It's not worth risking any type of job discipline to help a customer. I don't know that if you approached a mailman they would be offended. I just hope they would have enough common sense to decline to assist you. Also, we don't deliver the route each day so even if one carrier agreed to assist you there is no way of knowing that when they are off from work the replacement carrier would smart to not get involved with any favors. If what you are doing is unethical or shady I would not get the USPS involved.
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I am not sure how you would get the full name of your postman. I read that he won't give you his last name. I have no idea whether or not he has any obligation to do so. I gladly would give it out, if asked. It is also on my ID badge that I wear. I feel that it should be available to the public, but I am sure you will find great disagreement among my colleagues. If you were to call the PO and ask them, I have a feeling they wouldn't give it to you either. Some people get very private about certain matters, yet they will join Facebook and broadcast a lot about their personal lives. That's about all of the insight I have on this subject. Thanks for writing.
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Another good question on this message board that I dont know the answer to. We rarely ever look at or are directed to a USPS employee handbook. I am sure it exists but don't know where it is at my PO. I am pretty sure my supervisor would have it at their desk or know where to find it. As far as writing a personal note directly on a letter, I would suggest that it not be done, but I can't say that it is against the rules. In general I don't think we should be making any comments or judgments about the mail that somebody receives. I'm not saying we don't talk about it internally but I wouldn't comment (in person or in writing) to the mail recipient or anybody else in public. That would be completely inappropriate. Please notice I don't use the word "illegal" here as I am not versed in the legality or disciplinary actions that are in play here, if any. The only time I would write directly on the mail is if I'm not familiar with the name of the recipient on a piece of mail that differs from the current residents that I know live at a particular address. In this case, I put a "?" next to the addressees name and deliver the letter. By doing this, the current residents can accept the letter or realize I wasn't sure if it was delivered correctly and leave it out for me the next day to return to the sender as "Attempted, Not Known." Thanks for writing.
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I would guess about 2 weeks if you were to get it back at all. Theoretically if you sent it to the wrong address and it was delivered there, it is conceivable that the recipient may not return the letter to the mail carrier even though they should. If you sent the letter to an address that doesn't exist, the item should be returned with the endorsement "No Such Street" or "No Such Number". I am just not sure of the actual time frame it would take for it to get back to you. It may depend on the workload of the nixie (not deliverable mail) at the destination PO. Thanks for your inquiry.
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Sure, the letter should reach its destination as long as it has the proper address and ZIP code. The only issue could be if the letter would need to be returned to you for some reason and you no longer are at the motel and there is nowhere to send the letter to. You don't need to put a return address on the letter to begin with. It's your own choice.
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