Lazy mailman

[bhskittykatt]

So, since the road construction began near the end of our driveway, we haven't been getting our mail.

Basically, the "Road Closed" signs are right past our driveway. The mailboxes are just on the other side of the signs on the other side of the street. They're adjacent to the walkway that goes to the restaurant next door. Even though the road is closed to car traffic, I use the restaurant's walkway (since the sidewalk further down is closed) without issue, and I regularly check the mailboxes. No mail.

Two other businesses are on our little road, with all three of our mailboxes in a nice little cluster. Today, CW called them to see if they've been missing their mail. As it turns out, Restaurant (which opened just a few weeks ago) was getting calls threatening to shut off their water and electricity if they didn't pay their bills. They hadn't gotten their bills to pay them! The fast food restaurant that's also on our road also has not been getting their mail.

So CW called the post office to complain. The postmaster general had no idea our mail wasn't being delivered! Apparently, our mailman has just been leaving it in his truck or somewhere, since the office had no clue there was an issue with the delivery! So we couldn't even go pick it up anywhere if we wanted to.

The mailman complained it was unsafe. CW asked if he could deliver it directly to the businesses instead of the mailboxes. The mailman said he couldn't get into our driveway. CW pointed out that UPS and FedEx, with trucks TWICE the size of the mailman's, have been giving us our regular delivery, and we've had guests with even larger box trucks get into our lot (with some difficulty, but they did make it!).

As a paper carrier, I understand the perspective that delivering to a business instead of a mailbox increases the relative delivery time by several times, however (1) it's only three businesses that are affected here and (2) it's a temporary delivery adjustment. Really, the mailman is just being lazy if he can't take an extra 5 minutes to drop off our mail at the businesses instead of the mailboxes. He just doesn't want to get out of his truck.

We're lucky that pretty much all our bills go through Corporate. I know Restaurant doesn't have that luxury, and I'm not sure what setup the fast food restaurant has. CW told them they all needed to complain as well if we don't start getting our mail this week.

[Javarod]

And the post office wonders why its going out of business. Sure, this isn't the only problem, but its not the first time i've heard of it. Heck, by all appearances, carriers can suspend your mail for any reason they desire, if they lie, its not like anyone's going to check, nor does anyone audit them (i run distribution for a free magazine, every month or two, i go out after the deliveries checking a random sampling).

[fma_fanatic]

The other thing to watch out for is that if you complain and go past the Postmaster of the post office they're based out of, they can retaliate.

We had ours retaliate after a package I was expecting ended up out in the rain rather than in the package receptacle it was supposed to go because I complained all the way up to the Office of the Consumer Advocate because they would keep delivering mail that wasn't ours, even after I spoke to the Postmaster.

When I complained about it, the answer was "Well there were cars in the parking lot". As if that was an answer at all. We live in a townhouse complex, of course there are going to be cars there! Does that mean we own all the cars there now?

After that, I got a P.O. Box.

[MoonCat]

We had a problem at my old house with mail delivery once. Called them, they complained about a hornet's nest on the house. Fair enough, we found a way to get rid of it.

Then they stopped delivering again. But they left a note, complaining about: "Rats, birds and squirrels." OK, I can understand not liking rats, but we had no control over that because the house next door was abandoned and rats had turned up there. I called the city and they put out rat poison but there were still rats around. But BIRDS & SQUIRRELS??? I kid you not, it was on the note in plain English.

[Merriweather]

And the post office wonders why its going out of business. Sure, this isn't the only problem, but its not the first time i've heard of it. Heck, by all appearances, carriers can suspend your mail for any reason they desire, if they lie, its not like anyone's going to check, nor does anyone audit them (i run distribution for a free magazine, every month or two, i go out after the deliveries checking a random sampling).

I once lived in an apartment, one of four (two buildings with two apartments each). Not a big complex, just those four. The front doors did not face the street, but instead were on the side, the doors of one building facing the doors of the other, across a driveway. So more or less a small square. Each apartment had it's own mailbox by its front door.

One person owned a rather large dog, very friendly. I'm not terribly fond of large dogs, but this one didn't scare even me. One day he happened to be outside when the mailman ran. He barked at the mailman, and the mailman did not realize the owner was outside as well.

He went back to the post office, and told them the person had a large menacing dog which he let run loose outside and he was afraid of being attacked. He refused to deliver mail there. Not just to that apartment, but to any of the four.

We all complained, the owner offered to be sure the dog was inside at that time of day, etc. Didn't matter. The post office refused to take any action, change carrier routes, or anything. We had to pick up our mail at the post office several blocks away. For close to a year I had to make a trip to the post office to get my mail - and since I worked the hours they were open during the week, I was only able to ge tmy mail once a week, on Saturday.
Oh, and this was pre-internet, so much more was done by mail.

[PepperElf]

Mine barks every time the post shows up cos there's someone outside. Of our two carriers the female often hears me talking to the dog and knocks on the door to deliver. The male says nothing.

I think he's a little annoyed I'll let Dublin out when he's there but... she's on a tight leash. And then I take her for a walk to get the heebie-jeebies out of her (and so she can poop). (i dunno where that phrase came from, it's one of my Dad's)


Growing up though we had both good and bad. The first one I remember, did his route until he passed away (). We liked Marty. He was always friendly and appreciated that we didn't have any flowers on our mailbox like some of the other people did. (sticking his hand into a bee-magnet was not his idea of fun). Although we once put the cat in the box just to surprise him. it was open slightly so she could breathe (and she was in there for maybe 30 seconds). Still he had a laugh when he opened it up and the cat stuck her head out at him sniffing.

After he passed away the replacement was... a bit of an odd duck as mom said. friendly at first but then she got touchy.

we had one neighbor Irene (passed away last year in the fall) who often went to another state to stay with her sister. She never set up mail forwarding, always afraid of it, so we just picked up her mail and remailed it to her. Marty knew I think but just didn't care because it didn't hurt anyone and he knew she was being taken care of by friendly neighbors. The new postwoman got touchy about it and started dropping hints that she'd have people arrested for helping Irene like that.

I mean sure technically she could but it seemed more like she was itching to exercise power.

And I forgot what happened. Mom had a complaint about something. Next thing she knew things started showing up later. Like 3-day sale advertisements that show up on the last day of the sale. little things like that.

she was never entirely sure if it was the postwoman but she had a feeling it was.


but here... as i said things aren't bad. and to be honest i think the postwoman we have here thinks the dog is cute. especially since such a medium sized dog is so keen on protecting us from everything.

[Andara Bledin]

My favorite evil mailman story happened to my aunt.

She was having problems with getting some of her mail; rather important stuff like her mortgage documents.

When the investigation into the carrier finally reached the tipping point, it was found that he'd been stealing people's mail for years. Almost entirely financial documents and statements, but also a large number of periodicals. I was living there at the time, and one of my magazine subscriptions regularly arrived late and missing it's plastic cover because this creep was reading it before delivering it.

My current carrier seems pretty solid. He totally ignores the barking dogs and does his thing. Not sure how good he is about picking up mail, however, because we just drop it at the post office with our daily PO Box pickup at work.

^-.-^

[Solumina]

Wow this makes me super grateful that the only issue I've had with mail carriers is when they don't drop off packages at the apartment office and leave one of those notices of failed delivery attempt, despite being repeatedly told that they should be dropped off at the office.

[Jay 2K Winger]

I have nothing negative to say about our mailman. He's punctual, delivers the mail that comes in, takes the mail that's going out, and even periodically leaves a dog biscuit in for us to give to our dog. (Who usually tries to "bury" it in the sofa cushions.)

I wish I could say the same about the UPS/Fedex delivery people, especially when delivering my Dad's medication, which needs to be refrigerated. Sure, it's in a styrofoam box with disposable cooling packs, but it's the principle of the thing.

[Der Cute]

I've always loved my mail carriers. Been sweet and on time, just cool.

[PepperElf]

When the investigation into the carrier finally reached the tipping point, it was found that he'd been stealing people's mail for years. Almost entirely financial documents and statements, but also a large number of periodicals. I was living there at the time, and one of my magazine subscriptions regularly arrived late and missing it's plastic cover because this creep was reading it before delivering it.

i think they had that problem on my third ship. one of my shipmates was involved in the investigation because one of his electronics purchases arrived and when he opened the box it was empty. I think they did end up catching the thief however.

magazines however were open game. unless sealed. people didn't care who the magazine was for they would read whatever came into the shop. even if the owner wanted to read it first. sometimes i could squirrel it away to give to the owner (i was one of the people who picked up mail) but sometimes it didn't work.

[kpzra]

I'm in a battle right now with ours. She leaves packages at the end of the driveway where you don't see them, until you run them over. I complained about that, and about an "attempted delivery" when she didn't even slow down, much less stop to deliver the package. We didn't get mail for a week after that. We get weekly grocery ads, so I know it wasn't being delivered. The latest was when I tried to grab my package at the post office before she got it, only to get into it with the Post Master. I watched her throw my glass goblets into the front yard over the fence after sitting there honking. Good thing they were well packaged. We don't plan on being here long so we don't want to get a PO Box...plus we spent the last few years paying for one since we couldn't get mail delivery where we lived in Alaska.

[laborcat]

Wow... reading all these make me very much more thankful for Rachel. She's the best! She was never afraid of the Rottweiler we had and just loves Hannah to death now. She helped the extremely elderly lady across the street move her trash cans back up to the house one day. I hate it when she has to cover vacations because then we get some idiot that doesn't bring our mail until like five or six in the evening. Usually for Christmas I bake her a box of assorted goodies since I know she can't take cash or anything else.

My grandfather worked for the post office for the majority of his life and was postmaster there in the little hodunk town he lived in for as long as I can remember until he retired in the late 1980's. I loved going in there and watching him work. It saddens me to think that it has fallen to this level.

[blas]

My Dad and the mailman had an epic battle that ended up with Dad complaining to the postmaster.....and the mailman has been retaliating here and there, on and on, for the two or three years since. Not constantly, just often enough to remind us he's still "in charge" of the mail.

It all started because he refused to deliver mail if anyone's car was anywhere near the mailbox, because he didn't like to have to put any extra effort into parking next to the mailbox. Lazy ass. So Dad complained to the postmaster and actually tracked the guy down and had it out with him and got our mail. After that, our mail would mysteriously show up at the neighbor's house once every couple of months.

One day there was an auction down the road. The mailman put EVERYONE on the block's mail after the neighbors' into my parents' mailbox, the guy across the street, and the neighbors' mailbox. Yeah, so my dad and the neighbors played mailman, and called in the complaint.

After that, the mailman threw a fit that my parents' mailbox wasn't up high enough. Funny, it was never a problem before that. So my parents to prove a point back, got a post that was several inches bigger. And got a new thingy of numbers for the address, with the last number being larger than the rest, to prove that their mail did NOT belong at the address next door. Still happens from time to time, though.

If I'm ever awake on, say, a Friday at my parents' when the mailman comes (since no one else is there), and he can see me inside (very large windows), he'll make a dramatic show and pretend to struggle to fit his tiny little mailtruck by the mailbox because my car is "in the way". He does that any time he can see someone inside the house.

Can I say, this dude needs to get fired.

[Teskeria]

Where I lived in Boston, the mailman would not deliver if you didn't shovel your walk (city law btw). Now if it was just an inch or so, he would go through it, but 4 inches or more, had to be shoveled. To visualize, I am heavyset and physically handicapped. I need a cane to walk and balance. So I am expecting a certain package, and I am living alone (mailman does know that as we talked occasionally when we met and he knew my daughter had moved to LA). Naturally I am out shoveling at my walk. one handed since the cane is in the other and balancing me (30' of walkway usually took me about 2 hrs if it was about 6"). And he yelled' at me that I didn't need to shovel for him, as he understood how difficult it was and he would ensure my mail got delivered regardless. I loved that postman. a true gentleman in the best meaning of the word.