At this point, I’m laughing. I’ve given up taking mail delivery seriously around here. One thing I will remember about Texas is that, for the most part, our mail delivery was good.
As I’ve said before, I understand that Covid has screwed up everything, including the mail. I understand it’s the holidays and there’s a ton of mail, probably more than in previous years due to families not getting together but, we basically started getting mail here in August and it’s been bad since Day 1. We get mail and USPS delivered packages that aren’t ours. Other people get ours. Last week I had to drive to town and meet a lady from another town who had received one of my packages. She said she has a package that shows delivered and she didn’t get it and no one has contacted her.
I understand taking longer than normal. I don’t understand mail being stuck in wrong boxes over and over and packages being left at wrong houses over and over, nor do I understand the tracking saying it has been delivered if it hasn’t been delivered.
That brings me to the latest issue: I’ve been tracking everything – first, because of the service and second, because Vince is on his second cross stitch piece and I still don’t have anything to work on. The only thing keeping me halfway sane is that packages arriving after Vince leaves could result in less explaining on my part.
Here’s the tracking on a package I’m waiting on:
It was supposedly delivered on Saturday. We can see the driveway so we generally know if someone is coming or delivering mail at the box but we had been downstairs a lot. It was about 9 p.m. when I saw that it had been delivered. I knew we were upstairs at 8:40 a.m. and would have seen them but I still went out to the mail box (for the second time in case someone else received it and stuck it in our mail box), looked around the front porch. No package. I figured one of the neighbors had received it and it would eventually show up. I can’t even come up with a plausible explanation. Obviously, it never got delivered anywhere on the 12th or it would not have been back in Springfield on the 13th. I suppose, since it says delivered at 8:40 a.m. on the 12th, someone else could have gotten it it and taken it to the post office almost immediately on the 12th, and then it ended up back in Springfield on the 13th. Who knows??
I’ve given up trying to figure it out but it’s all making me think twice about ordering anything that has to be delivered by USPS.
Sibyl Scott says
Judy we have been saying this for years here with our postal service. Thing is how do you know who ships with USPS vs UPS vs FedEx you don’t. You are at the mercy of the post office. I don’t blame COVID at all on this–as this has been going on way greater than that–like I’ve said before at least the last 20 years in my neighborhood. Just keep watching–more than likely you will get it–but I have come to the conclusion that these people just do not know how to read. How can they not know one address from another–and in your case–one town vs another. No excuse at all. Hope you get your stuff soon.
Judy Laquidara says
I agree but as soon as I complain, someone is going to say “IT’S COVID!”
Since I’m new here, I can’t say how long it’s gone on but it definitely isn’t totally holiday related because it’s been this way since August. My feeling is that too many of them just don’t care and there’s no accountability. I’ve complained and now I’m the bad guy because I expect mail to be delivered to the right house and if it says delivered, then it should be either in the box or somewhere that I can find it.
Most things do seem to arrive sooner or later.
Sheryl says
We get most of our mail at the post office but we don’t go to town every day so that makes Donnie unhappy when he has a stack of boxes. It’s maddening when there are this kind of problems with USPS delivery.
Joyce says
Package delivery seems to be a lot worse than normal right now. I have a package that was “delivered to a partner facility” in Indiana on December 6. It has not moved since then. In my head it got knocked off a shelf and slid underneath where it won’t be found for months…LOL
Nancy H. says
We discovered that the tracking with USPS was really weird when I started using informed delivery. I get an email every morning that says what should be in my mail that day. There have been a couple of times when I get a note on my phone for an amazon package that says delivered. But when I look at the USPS site it says the package is in some other city. I finally figured out that the note from Amazon meant they had handed it over to USPS and it would be a couple more days before we got it.
We have an app in our phones called NextDoor. You sign up and can communicate with neighbor. A few months ago someone posted a picture of a package that had been delivered to the empty house on her street. I looked at the name and address and realized it was my neighbor who I know is not on line very often so I reached out and told the lady I would come get it for my neighbor. She ended up delivering it when she figured out it was a real person. My neighbor has an unusual name and she thought it was fake.
We get letters for neighbor but no packages. UPS is usually pretty good because our son-in-law was the distribution center manager for awhile and the guys figured out I had a direct line when something went awry.
Judy Laquidara says
Thanks for reminding me about NextDoor. I need to change that to here.
Laura says
Seems like it could be a regional problem. I live in central California and the USPS has been just about flawless. Other types of deliveries have been good too, although not always accurate on when the package will arrive. Sometimes they’re actually early! I’m sorry it’s so bad where you live.
Judy Laquidara says
I think you’re right because, as I said, at our location in Texas, our deliveries were almost always right. Here is a totally different story and I’ve had several people, just in the course of conversation without me bringing it up, tell me mail delivery here is not good.
Dottie Newkirk says
When we lived in the metro DC area, our mail delivery was GREAT with the postal carriers that had been there a long time. When we had temps delivering, mail was misdelivered multiple times (this was over a 20 year period). Obviously WAY before covid, elections or anything else.
Where we live now, we have NO home delivery service – have to go to the post office for everything. One thing about the P. O. box is if something gets misdelivered to the wrong box, it’s easy to just give it back to the post office.
Debbie K. says
I dropped off a prepaid package at the post office on the 8th. Actually handed it to the clerk because there was a mountain of drop offs on the counter. It is my parents’ Christmas gifts. When I checked Saturday on the tracking it said the post office was waiting for my package. Of course no one answered the phone. I was a bit beside myself. You know, it is for my parents and they are in their late 80’s.
I don’t know what to do. I figure it will leave the post office at some point. I mean, it is at the appropriate drop off point. What can I do? It has been a bit frustrating this year.
Carolyn says
The post office has me very frustrated. I paid for Priority 2 day mailing to Florida for a package to my daughter. It should have arrived on Friday, Saturday at the latest. When I checked on Saturday night it had gone from southern NJ to Albany, NY? Really? It needs to go that far north to go south? I don’t think so! Will check it again tonight when I get home from work, but I’ll bet it hasn’t moved from NY!
Rebecca says
Just double-checked with my husband, and we never have any problems (knock wood). It does seem to be largely a regional problem; some commenters mentioned KC. My husband was saying that he sees the same complaints from people in his (small) hometown in Michigan.
Jeanie says
In October I had a certified letter mailed from a bank in Bolivar, Mo to me in Independence, MO. It took 11 days to get here!!! It sat in Springfield most of that time.
Nelle Coursey says
We have the problem that we live on Vincent and Vine is the next street over. We have the same mail carrier and they do get us confused some time. If we have the same carrier for any length of time, we don’t have problems. I think it is because it is a small town and county.
AmyMakson says
IT is so bad this year… sure, covid has something to do with it. And also because of covid, many more people are shopping online. But it seems here, the main issue is when the package starts with UPS or DSL, then gets transferred to USPS. They sit for weeks in a “transfer area”. Many people besides me are seeing the same thing. Someone went to the post office and was told Amazon packages get delivered first, as they are right now USPS biggest customer, then, when they get to them, they take care of the other packaged. Truly frustrating. THEN you have the human error responsible for things going to the wrong house… double whammy!! I wish I could find everything I need locally, but cannot. Good luck!
Twyla Starr says
Our UPS guy for many years gets so frustrated at Christmas because the temps do not deliver to correct address or leave pkgs way out at the end of driveway. He thinks they do not really care because it is a temp job and they get paid no matter how they deliver. We have always been lucky to have really good mail lady for 18 years and now a good mail lady and sub. I do feed them as often as I bake and leave out a little Christmas something and sometimes other holiday something.