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.
To be honest Henry, I don't know what happens when you drop a UPS package off in a USPS collection box by mistake. The logical thing would be for us to hand it off to UPS somehow. UPS drop boxes and drivers are pretty easy to find in NYC. You say there is no UPS tracking information that's been updated. Like you said, I doubt it will be turning up anywhere but I don't know what would happen to it unless it's sitting on some pile of errantly mailed items at a mail sorting facility. Nothing surprises me at the USPS when it comes to missing items. I hate to be a pessimist but I hear enough stories of us errantly delivering mail or packages and then who knows what the recipient does with it, if anything. I try to be very accurate and diligent with my deliveries as do most of my co-workers but it just takes a few screw-ups to ruin the journey of a package or letter which was properly mailed. I know I got off on a tangent here. Maybe you could wait another week before considering it lost or call the USPS customer service phone number. I'm not sure how much help they can be in this situation.
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It depends on where your letter is being mailed to. I think nationwide most letters reach their destination in 2-3 days, but probably no sooner than that. The mailbox you deposited the letter into said collection is m-f at 5PM. That means that as long as the letter was deposited prior to box posted time, your letter will be dispatched that day for processing and transport. It's possible that the letter was collected before 5PM on Monday but that would be a decision made locally by the post office. If it was collected early someone would still have to go to empty the collection box at or after the posted time.
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Congratulations on sticking with the job as the CCAs really get the brunt of a lot of the work and have unpredictable schedules at times. With regard to making your shoes last longer, I don't know if I have a good answer. My shoes get wet in the rain as well and I didn't realize that the water sometimes accelerates the breakdown of the shoe, but I do notice it as of late. My main suggestion for making the shoes last with regard to not getting them wet is to wear rubber overshoes which can be purchased with the uniform allowance. Tingley is a well known brand for these products. They keep your shoes dry but when it's not wet out you wouldn't want to wear them as the rubber may wear out easier walking on dry ground. When wearing these be careful to get them on with a tight fit with regards to your toes and heel because you may trip easier with loose fitting rubber overshoes.
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That sounds somehwat accurate. I am no expert when it comes to administering the ODL. It also seems to change from office to office as to what counts and what doesn't count for OT. In our office if you are next up to be asked in for your NS day and you are unavailable or refuse then you'd be "marked" for an 8-hour opportunity. As for where you'd be on the list the following week, it depends how many of the other carriers in your group came in on Tuesday. If all of the other three car came in (or refused) on their NS day it's possible you'd still be first for next week. In our office the total amt of OT hrs you worked for the quarter (which would include pieces on other routes) also affects where you are placed each week on the list for the NS day. Those with the lowest amt of OT hrs in a quarter are usually asked first for their NS day. I hope this helps a little bit but your office may operate differently.
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It's possible that either things happened. It may depend on where you live, but actually having things from mailboxes where I work is quite rare. As far as a letter carrier taking it out of the mailbox, I can't really say. Some letter carriers are strict and say nothing can be in the mailbox except US Mail. If they take it out I'm not sure what they'd be doing with it. I am not really sure how you'd find out. I doubt the PO would be of much help. As much as I don't like things left in mailboxes that aren't US mail, if I can clearly see it's not outgoing mail, I'll usually just leave it and put the mail in the box. I have to stress that I can predict the actions of other letter carriers. I've seen too many who don't care and can be vindictive toward customer which I don't understand.
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If a neighborhood has cluster boxes, it's usually a group of 6-30 addresses per cluster box. I actually made up that number. Where I deliver to cluster boxes, they range from 4-16 addresses per cluster box. As the letter carrier, I have a key which opens up the cluster box fully and then i can sort all of the mail for those addresses at one time. The boxes are usually well labeled inside (with the cluster panel open) to know where to put the mail. It's important for the letter carrier to know whether to put the mail either above or below the address if the slots are stacked vertically. I have seen my fellow letter carriers, and I'm sure myself make errors in deliveries to cluster boxes. I also live in an apartment building where mail is delivered into cluster boxes near the elevators. It can get more tedious than walking from door to door delivering mail but it is more efficient to deliver mail to cluster box units.
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Do you possibly know me? I've recently had a similar situation on the route that I deliver and it is the first time that I encountered this. The previous owner only put in an individual forward, but the PARS (which is an automated forwarding system that intercepts forwardable mail before it reaches the letter carrier) was forwarding the new resident's mail as well because they had the same last name. I asked my forwarding clerk how to resolve this. She said that the family that left should just put in individual forwards for each family member. The mail also should be excluded from PARS so your letter carrier can look at each piece of mail before forwarding it (if appropriate). This seems to have worked okay as the new resident has been quite patient and I've heard nothing beyond the original, and valid I might add, complaint. I'd recommend speaking to someone at your PO explaining the situation, give them a list of all the valid names at your address and ask that the mail be excluded from PARS so the carrier can look at the mail and decide whether it should be forwarded or not. PARS stands for Postal Automated Redirection System. I hope this works out for you as you shouldn't be inconvenienced just because you moved into a residence where the previous people had the same last name.
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