What is up with the Post Office?

12 views and no one thought my constructive criticism was worth leaving a positive vote up.

Fine let the post office go all to hell...

Then you can sit asking yourself what happened?

Have you ever tried to call the post office to complain about a rerouted package?

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Random rants welcome

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MUCH MORE VITAL THAN FIXING THE POST OFFICE!

1 1/2 stars out of 5
https://www.yelp.com/biz/us-post-office-elmhurst-3

Typical of many offices nationwide.

I am not saying that moving millions of packages is not a difficult task but it seems there is room for improvement considering packages are sent to the wrong terminals as if it is a money making scheme.

Almost on a regular basis every couple weeks my packages are sent to my local terminal then sent from there to a terminal an hour away! Then sent back to my terminal, then delivered to my PO Box (which costs me 80 dollars a year)....

Like the US Postal Service, our Post Office uses automatic recognition of addresses. Items pass along conveyors and a camera reads (or tries to read) the address, especially the postal code. This all happens very rapidly and the computer assigns a degree of confidence to how well it thinks it read the code. It may assign a low degree of confidence to an item with a badly handwritten, smudged or partly obscured code, and a zero score if it is missing altogether or hidden. Low score items are kicked out for manual sorting, sometimes at a different depot. Essentially, items are collected locally to the point of initial mailing, and pass through a first depot. When they come out their next stop depends on where the computer thinks they need to go. Sometimes it knows a truck is going to a town near the right one sooner than one going right to the final destination. Its priority is to maximise throughput and get stuff out and on the road. I work for an organization in my country which has a PO box number as an alternative to the ordinary street address of our building. Sometimes we get items which have two or three different depot locations stamped on them, usually beause of bad coding or torn labels. It's all logistics. You get glitches but a very large percentage of mail gets to its destination on time, around 95%. Considering the volume posted, and the price of postage, that is probably as good as you can reasonably expect. Your evidence is anecdotal (you notice your misrouted items, but not the many millions of others that are not).

Perhaps since you posted during the Sunday morning time, our religious folk were off to church activities and others were off to do the laundry, visit friends or family or some other weekend activity.

Reasons for the post office decline are numerous. Sure, some things appear to go a circuitous route, others however, don't. Is that truly the number one reason for their financial challenges?

I submit to you the idea that a bigger challenge comes from the modern technology which offers up emails as a faster way of communicating. Then of course many delight in the use of texting (I never have texted anybody, my nephew almost lives by it). Gone are the days of trudging down the road to the general store for getting a letter or package from Aunt Lucy or Grampa Wolfie. Or even just going to the mailbox in a building lobby or outside your front door. Things change.


Things change! You should know this, with a handle of "the cobbler". Where have all the cobblers gone? They used to be all around for shoe repairs, now, almost all gone.


As for routing of mail, remember companies such as FedEx use a hub. All packages go from point A to the hub then on to the next destination. Maybe the hub idea works.


(and your gripe about the postal system would've fit into the Random Rant thread Chai had set up)

The British Post Office addresses some of the issues around mail routing by offering a discount if users put a 'Mailmark' on the front of each envelope as well as the printed or handwritten address. They can be generated by the software that prints the address labels used by bulk mail users. Small users can get franking machines that print them on an letter by letter basis (you type the code on a keyboard)

I think the US Post Office is fine, but I think they need to fix that package routing failure rate. Are packages getting physically switched on a conveyer system, is it human error or did the computer not scan the barcode right?

I just think someone would fix this so millions of packages are not being unnecessarily sent to the wrong place.

I usually have always had a good experience with then US Post Office but their mailing routine needs some fine tuning.

My packages have been late but they have never lost my mail.

I would rate the US Post Office 5 stars on Yelp (hoping they would fix the mail routing problem.)

Should first class mail be renamed second class mail?

Priority mail is actually first class.

First class mail has no tracking and no insurance. So, if you send a package and it gets lost you are out of luck finding where it went.

The only people who fall for that "first class" deal are people with poor English skills who might insist "first class" must be the best. Then their packages get lost.

For clarity sake "first class mail" is now really, second class service.

Has anyone noticed that the Post Office is doing a lot better of a job sending packages more directly to their destinations? No longer (that I have noticed) are packages sent from Milwaukee to Maine by way of Texas.

I am not sure that the hired help is any friendlier or helpful (maybe less) but at least the routing system is more accurate, it seems.

(the forms at the Post Office need simplifying) Even an English speaking person needs a road map to fill them out. The hired help could receive better training to help non English speaking people with filling out forms. Instead of handing them a form and sending them on their own to fill it out they could assist a bit more.

It certainly would clarify issues should they arise later down the road.

Our local Post Office is thoroughly sprigged up. I first noticed it when a package I had to sign for languished in the post office. I contacted the sender and they notified me it was on the verge of getting returned. I picked it up that day and I asked to speak to a supervisor. The man said, "I am the supervisor." He said if it happens again, he will do something about it. But it was repeated three times and they just frowned at me when I complained. So I registered a complaint on line. Next time they did everything by the book. Then reverted to not letting me know when they had my packages. I went on line to complain a second time, but that feature had been disabled for me. Also, tracking was denied me. So I started having them delivered where I used to work and my old boss took them for me.

Last week, two employees from there were arrested for theft and there is an ongoing investigation of that post office,

There are different classes of mail, they vary according to what you are sending and urgency. Currently second class is one of the slowest ways to go. It was at one time for magazines, newspapers and the such. Items which had no real urgency. Not sure if it still goes that way.

There's also a book rate, which usually arrives quicker than second class.

This post has been voted to zero in the course of a day, you know, the haters on this forum are winning...

Thanks to the hit and run way the voting system works here... And the propensity for, even good people, to just ignore when someone needs help.