Today I saw the USPS truck making its rounds down my street. I’ve been expecting a package to be delivered soon, if not today. When I went down to my mailbox to check my mail, what did I find but a “sorry we missed you” delivery attempt notice. I didn’t hear a knock on my door and I didn’t have the tv or radio on, so I can only assume that the postal worker was too lazy to walk up the stairs to my apartment and give it to me. Either that or he/she made a very weak and perfunctory attempt at knocking.
To make matters worse, the USPS doesn’t even automatically attempt to redeliver the next day as UPS and other private services do, much less for up to three attempts like UPS. One has to contact them to request it. And since I am flying out of state for several days tomorrow, I’ll have to stop by the local post office early in the morning to pick up my package. [sarcasm] Thanks for the inconvenience, Uncle Sam. [/sarcasm]
Geoffrey is an Aristotelian-Liberal political philosopher and an adjunct instructor for Buena Vista University. His work has appeared in the Journal of Libertarian Studies, the Journal of Value Inquiry, and Transformers and Philosophy. He lives in Edgewood, KY with his wife and two children.
No related posts.
Political Science PhD
{ 5 comments }
Next time you see your driver and are expecting something, maybe you should meet the carrier at the box. If you have a cluster of boxes, maybe the carrier is not required to “find” your apartment. Keep in mind if you are not normally at home the carrier may have left the package at the office so you could get it that day after he left a notice since he would have been out on the route still. And remember you are not the only box that carrier had to deliver to that day. You can always call for re-delivering on a day when you know you will be home.
Nice try.
I am normally at home, but I doubt the USPS drivers who have my route really have my living patterns memorized.
In any case, you totally missed the point of my post. The private services are more customer friendly, harder working, more reliable than that unnecessary government monopolist.
Just to let you know Geoffrey, “anonymous” is probably a USPS employee who does nothing more than search websites looking for “bad” press. I am a former USPS manager and I can detect postal lingo when I see it.
Thousands and thousands of carriers each day do not even attempt deliveries. They will not knock on your door. It is easier and less time consuming to leave a notice. The USPS has put so much pressure on the carriers, they are now taking short-cuts at the expense of the customer. Sad, I agree. I was a manager for 25 years and couldn’t take their tactics any longer. I refuse to be part of an organization that treat customers and employees like second class citizens.
So….”anonymous” didn’t miss your point. He/she knows exactly what you’re talking about. He/she was just trying to CIRCUMVENT your customer issue.
Thanks for the support. The thought did cross my mind that the poster had a vested interest in defending the USPS.
Incidentally, I now live in Bellevue, NE and I have often seen a particular postal vehicle parked by a nearby apartment complex for hours at a time. I wonder if the postal worker lives there or if he/she is delivering mail on foot to all the nearby houses and apartments or if he/she is taking a really long lunch break.
The USPS isn’t all bad service-wise, of course. The mail at my new apartment is usually delivered promptly by 1 pm. One nice feature of my new apartment complex is that it has several parcel boxes that postal carriers can put packages in; the key would then be placed in my mailbox. The mail carrier thus doesn’t have to tromp the 100 or so feet over and up to my door. Economic theory and history prove, however, that private enterprises are generally more efficient and customer friendly than government facsimiles. They also have the moral advantage of not forcing their service on you.
Update (04/17/08): It happened again.
I found one of those little orange forms in my mailbox stating a delivery had been attempted. Given the nature of the package, my signature is required. But did the postal worker do his job by climbing the stairs to my apartment door and making an actual effort at delivering the package? No. Lazy bastard. And unlike the private delivery services, the USPS doesn’t make three delivery attempts, or even two. Now I have to drive down to the post office to pick up the package, only my wife uses our only car for work and she often doesn’t get home before the post office closes.
Comments on this entry are closed.