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 don't know the answer to this, but if you bought a replacement flag that is able to go up and down, it would certainly help. As long as I'm stopping at a house to deliver mail and there is outgoing mail which is easily visible I will know to take it with me whether or not a flag is raised. The possible confusion comes on a day where there is no mail to be delivered to your address. In that case a letter carrier may not stop if there is no flag to notify of outgoing mail. Where I deliver mail (Long Island, NY) most addresses receive some type of mail daily (a local flyer or gov't mailing, advertising, etc) so this is rarely a problem. In your part of TX, this may not be the case so I can't really comment on the significance of having an operational flag.
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As long as there is mail to bring to any address we deliver 6 days per week (Mon-Sat). It's not always the same letter carrier who goes to the same address each day but it often is. If you live in an apartment and lost your mailbox key, I don't know that the letter carrier would open the mailbox for you or make any special delivery arrangements to deliver it to your suite or apartment unless they knew who you were and were willing to help until a replacement key could be acquired. I'm not even sure who would get you a replacement key, but I think it is the building management or the landlord.
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I would hope they let it go, but I can't say for sure what will happen to you. It should come back in the DPS or via your registry clerk. Hopefully it won't just disappear. I haven't heard of anybody being disciplined for this, but I work in a pretty small environment and don't know what happens in other offices. I hope it shows up, works out for you, and learn to be a bit more careful in the future with the accountable mail.
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When a house is for sale, I will continue to deliver mail there unless the current owner/occupant has moved out and I don't see a new name on incoming mail. In this case, I mark any incoming "resident" mail as "vacant" and either discard it or return it to the sender depending on the class of mail. Once I see a new name on incoming mail, I commence delivery to that house. I don't know if this is the correct procedure, but it seems to work out fine. Thanks for writing.
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That's good that you have a neighbor looking out for you. I don't know why the letter carrier would do what he did. Is it possible they didn't receive your forwarding order? If you did it online and received a confirmation then they likely got it. Furthermore there should be zero mail in your box if you have a temporary COA in effect and there are no other residents at your house who are receiving mail. It sounds like an oversight or carelessness. To answer your question, I would say no. Mail has to go through our CFS (computer forwarding system...or centralized forwarding system) to be redirected. You aren't allowed to handwrite the new address and then just redeposit it. One suggestion I have is for the neighbor to rubberband your mail and leave it in either your or their mailbox putting a note on top saying "please forward this mail as this addressee has a temporary COA in effect and no mail should be delivered to your permanent address until further notice". I hope that works out for you. Thanks for writing.
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I don't know if this would work and I generally don't like customers doing this but you could possibly find your letter carrier on their route earlier in the day and ask for it. Please understand that your mail could be somewhere not easily accessible in the delivery vehicle and the letter carrier may not want to make the effort to get it out for you. I rarely have anybody ask me for their mail early so I can't tell you how I would handle it. Is your mail that important that you can't wait until you return from holiday travel to retrieve it? Many people go days without taking in their mail from the mailbox. My recommendation would be to not ask for your mail early but it wouldn't hurt to try if it is that important to you. Happy Thanksgiving and travel safely.
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Yes, mail is delivered Monday-Saturday every week of the year except for 10 Federal Holidays observed by the USPS.
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