The Insanity of the United States Postal Service

Road rage. Yeah. I had to TEACH an acquaintance to stop a full car length back from the car ahead so as to have room to maneuver at a red light if someone pulled up beside her or got out of a car behind her with a tire iron in his hand. It wasn't just normal road rage then, she was worried about an "ex". School buses? The absolute worst. Intentionally hitting passers by with debris and laughing. Particularly the young brats, not just the senior class.

Post Office: After teh strike in NYC in the sixties things changed. Letter carriers had to pay to have their mail properly sorted. Everyone who could was putting the bite on someone else. Plum assignments, days off, deadlines, supervision.... all of it was pay to play. What was 'normal' before teh strike became 'pay me' after it. I can imagine the present postoffice might be the same thing. You want me to give you the form I'm supposed to... you pay. You want the paperwork submitted on your upgrade...what do you think I leave my desk drawer open for... you drop the money in there if you want something to make my 'out' box. You want me to find 'vacation relief' for you, no problem.... did I mention I like Scotch? You want a truck that actually has brakes...talk to Harry, he likes Gin.

PAIN: Oh heck, PBS just had a whole two hour session on special localilzed exercises for back pain. Even focused breathing can alleviate some of that pain. Eat strawberries while facing Mecca? Well, give teh strawberries a try and face any direction you want to. With your mechanical skills you could make your own hyperbaric oxygen chamber for pain alleviation, or buy the soft-sided ones they use at the site of sporting events. Heck, one of the most liberal treatment and sales places in the entire industry is in Law Vegas.... so there is a good excuse to visit a few casinos. They even let you book your appointments over the web.

15 years ago I inadvertently cut off a guy
in a pickup off on a four lane rd. He
got in front of me & did a 4 wheel lock-up
stop, trying to make me hit him in
the rear end. We were both stopped
and as soon as I saw his door open
I put it in reverse and went around him.

He did exactly the same thing again.
I almost hit him, I was shaking like a
leaf. Just then a cop car came along
and I got and stayed behind the cop
and the guy disappeared. I was shaking
for hours, I thought he was going kill me.

What does this mean? The package I sent is returning?

Quote:

Arrived at USPS Origin Facility
JACKSONVILLE, FL 32099
December 22, 2016 5:42 pm

Arrived at USPS Facility
CANAAN, NH 03741
December 19, 2016 4:44 pm

Out for Delivery
CANAAN, NH 03741
December 19, 2016 7:50 am

Sorting Complete
CANAAN, NH 03741
December 19, 2016 7:40 am

Arrived at Post Office
CANAAN, NH 03741
December 19, 2016 7:27 am

Arrived at USPS Destination Facility
NASHUA, NH 03063
December 18, 2016 1:40 pm

In Transit to Destination

December 18, 2016 12:00 am

Arrived at USPS Origin Facility
JACKSONVILLE, FL 32099
December 17, 2016 12:00 am

They sent it back because they couldn't deliver it.

It appears it's going all the way back again. Why'd they send it all the way back to Jacksonville? Now that's insanity.

Once declared undeliverable... thats it.
Maybe they tried once maybe not.

Quote: Fleastiff

Once declared undeliverable... thats it.
Maybe they tried once maybe not.

No, it went back to New Hampshire again. Still not delivered!

Our post offices drive us crazy...in person, both of the local cities (easy to get to) have slow and inefficient service. I am thankful for the ability to buy postage on eBay for sold items and for the machine for shipping in the lobby at the nearest Post Office. Both are much better options than standing in lines awaiting poor service from a clerk with a horrible attitude.

Our business moved in May. Our mail was supposed to be forwarded for one year. The amount of mistakes made in that process has been absolutely unacceptable. They have left first class mail at the old office, returned mail to sender, etc. just about as often as they get forwarding right. Since we count on checks coming in from customers, bad mail service just makes everything worse on a day to day basis. (I am trying to move the company forward to new payment options, but it is a slow process when people like the "old way"!!)

Quote: RonC

Our business moved in May. Our mail was supposed to be forwarded for one year. The amount of mistakes made in that process has been absolutely unacceptable. They have left first class mail at the old office, returned mail to sender, etc. just about as often as they get forwarding right. Since we count on checks coming in from customers, bad mail service just makes everything worse on a day to day basis. (I am trying to move the company forward to new payment options, but it is a slow process when people like the "old way"!!)

How about some insight?

First, the obvious - it's likely 0% your fault.

The USPS is a case study of the century on the Peter Principle. It boggles me how or why any co or corp would ever engage in promoting purely on seniority. I'm a teacher myself, and I'm batting near 1.000 on success. I've further experienced training from some drug users smoke shop that didn't even have accounting or inventory, all the way to the glorious experience of working for the tribal casino, and the USPS is just the worst. There simply is none. You learn by f#$%ing up and being corrected, and even then, you are only corrected <10% of the time, and correct correctly about 10% of THAT time. I was there well over six whole months before I learned anything about forwarding, premium holds, or anything beyond putting paper with a number into a corresponding numbered box. The amount of mail I simply made "go away" using the one option I was aware of is legendary. I suspect your issue is caused by this very reason.

I've been working full time hours for 14 months now. I just LAST WEEK learned another thing that seriously affected all my customers with holds. Info on those little yellow stickers? Had no idea. So a metric ton of "good forwards" that for some simple and easily correctable reason did not make it through, I straight up killed for no other reason than I was never made aware of the simple fix. And as it was a normal forward, that meant it was all first class. Bills, payments, checks, the lot. Killed them all.

Then you got the carrier themselves. Whether it's their own personal (lack of) constitution, or if it's the effect of being surrounded by mental defectives, there's no end to circumstances that make you not give a s#$% at all. When you're forced to stand around for an hour doing nothing because of some SNAFU, then get in trouble for not telling boss man something that you had no idea even existed (because you were never told), and then have something super important to you get denied because of no reason other than supervisory incompetence, how willing would you be to then purposely seek out this very a@#$@^% and have to spend time with him to assist getting some guy you don't know one piece of paper? That is completely unfair and I am genuinely embarrassed to say I have shirked my duty purely out of hate / frustration, but I've done exactly that. A lot. And if you expect that to be rectified, well, all I gotta do is schedule my disciplinary action at a time mildly inconvenient for the supe and he calls the whole thing off, letting me skate scott free. It's such a GD joke.

Babs and others defended .gov and used the USPS as a shining example, and at least what they posted, I agree. It is shocking that I can send you just about anything for just two quarters and have its physical being reach you way out in Texas faster than I could drive there myself. That's an amazing thing. But if you could somehow perform a miracle like, I dunno, HIRING BASED ON TALENT / ABILITY, stamps would be a dime, carriers would be getting $30/hr will full free benefits, and all of this would be paid for by nothing more than saving the waste created by incompetence.

A company is only as good as the
people who work for it. The problem
with the PO is it doesn't get rid of
the dead wood, the incompetent.
It's like you have a job for life no
matter how much you screw up,
how fat you get, or how much time
you miss.