It looks like The Mail Carrier Of Shame may soon have a slew of new members: Federal officials have accused 16 Atlanta-area U.S. Postal Service workers of accepting bribes in exchange for delivering cocaine along their routes. [More]
u.s. postal service
16 USPS Workers Join Mail Carrier Hall Of Shame For Allegedly Taking Bribes To Deliver Drugs
By 8.31.17
It’s Disturbingly Easy To Reroute Someone Else’s Mail
By 4.28.17
The U.S. Postal Service has made the process of changing your address when you move super easy and convenient, by just filling out a form online and paying $1. Maybe that’s not so good, though: The process is so easy that an identity thief can redirect your mall to their address by just filling out a form online and paying $1. [More]
Former USPS Worker Joins Carrier Hall Of Shame With Mail Hoard Dating Back To 2000
By 2.23.17
We’ve all had a hard time keeping up at work at some point, maybe you get overwhelmed and things just pile up. But one former U.S. Postal Service worker admitted that he failed to deliver thousands of pieces of mail to residents over at least 14 years. [More]
USPS Gives Woman 7 Canaries To Replace Smashed Package Of Dead Birds It Delivered Before Christmas
By 12.30.16
A story that sounds like “The 12 Days of Christmas” gone horribly wrong is wrapping up with a happy ending (unless you happen to be a recently deceased canary): after delivering a smashed box filled with a half-dozen dead birds to a woman in Alabama, the U.S. Postal Service has successfully replaced the deceased avians with seven live canaries. [More]
Thieves Think They’re Stealing Gift Delivery; Make Off With Boxes Of Family Heirlooms & Dad’s Ashes Instead
By 12.22.16
‘Tis the season for thieves across the country to swoop down upon doorsteps, porches, and stoops to swipe all those gift deliveries waiting outside folks’ homes. But somewhere in Ohio there’s a thief who now has boxes of very personal items — including the ashes of a dearly departed dad — that are worthless to the thief, but mean the world to the family from which they were stolen. [More]
USPS Takes In More Revenue, Needs To Spend More On Workers And Vehicles
By 11.16.16
Here’s the problem that the U.S. Postal Service has with making money: it’s delivering more packages to quench our thirst for online shopping, but carrying more packages means that the service needs more and upgraded vehicles, and to pay more people to deliver those packages. If the USPS simply reported its profit and loss, it would have had a $200 million profit for fiscal year 2016, but things are not that simple when you’re a quasi-governmental agency. [More]
Video Shows USPS Worker Dumping Bins Of Mail In A Ditch
By 10.20.16 — Updated: 2.23.17
Yet another United States Postal Service employee is joining The Mail Carrier Hall Of Shame, after being accused of dumping hundreds of pieces of mail into a ditch — while a local filmed the whole thing. [More]
The Mail Carrier Hall Of Shame Inducts A New Member Accused Of Interfering With Mail
By 8.18.16 — Updated: 2.23.17
Are we shocked to hear that a Florida mail carrier was accused of unloading hundreds of pieces of mail into a pizzeria’s trash bin? Not so much, because we’ve seen this happen enough to induct this latest suspect into the Mail Carrier Hall Of Shame, which is a thing we just made up. [More]
U.S. Postal Service Asks To Continue Grocery Delivery Experiment Until Fall 2017, Expand To More Cities
By 7.12.16
Looking for more revenue sources, the U.S. Postal Service would really like to put their delivery fleet and employees to work delivering pretty much anything that someone will pay them to deliver. That includes groceries, dry cleaning, and pretty much anything else that will fit in a USPS vehicle that can be lugged to customers’ doorsteps. A test of “customized delivery services” began back in 2014, and the USPS has asked to extend it until October 2017. [More]
Postal Worker Caught On Security Camera Pepper-Spraying Family Dogs
By 6.28.16
Last week, something pretty normal happened at a house in Houston: the postal carrier brought the mail, and the dogs hanging out in the yard barked at him. What happened next, caught on a security camera, was unusual: the man sprayed all three dogs with what appears to be pepper spray, even though they were secured behind a heavy gate. [More]
NYC Postal Worker “Overwhelmed” By Holiday Deliveries Accused Of Dumping 1,000 Pieces Of Mail
By 12.30.15
If you live in the New York City area and didn’t receive as many gifts and holiday cards this year, there could be a reason for that beyond the usual U.S. Postal Service mistakes: according to a criminal complaint filed in Queens, one mailman was under so much seasonal pressure that he just dumped about 1,000 pieces of mail in the trash. [More]
Head Of Local Post Office Shows Up At Guy’s Door To Personally Apologize For USPS Package Tracking Mix-Up
By 10.1.15
Remember Tony? He’s the guy who was waiting around for a package to be delivered by the U.S. Postal Service, only to find that the online tracking said a carrier had attempted to deliver it while he was out briefly — an event that video from his home security system proved never happened. While it’s still unclear what exactly led to the contradicting tracking info — something many, many of our readers have said they’ve experienced — there’s a happy ending in this case at least: Tony says the new postmaster in charge of his local office showed up on Wednesday to personally apologize to him for the mix-up. [More]
The U.S. Postal Service Is Open To Delivering Anything To Raise Cash
By 8.18.15
Do you need something delivered? Perhaps a case of water, some booze, or maybe a box of fresh fish? Consider turning to the same people who bring you birthday cards and jury duty summonses: the U.S. Postal Service is now delivering groceries to customers in seven cities, and also doing same-day delivery in some markets of things you might not expect to see on a postal truck. [More]
3 Postal Workers Accused Of Stealing From The “Operation Santa” Program Like A Bunch Of Grinches
By 6.18.15
Wherever you have people trying to do something good for others, you’ll inevitably have others trying to twist that effort for their own benefit. There’s not always a name for these greedy people, but in the case of three postal workers accused of rigging the “Operation Santa” program, the word “Grinch” is pretty darn fitting. [More]
Texas Postal Worker Accused Of Delivering Meth On His Mail Route
By 11.21.14
While it might be convenient to tweak one job to allow for working a second at the same time, delivering methamphetamine while out on the postal route is the kind of thing that gets you arrested. A Texas postal worker attempted that kind of illegal multi-tasking, police say, dropping off drugs while doing his mail rounds. [More]
Watch Out For Card Skimmers On Post Office Kiosks
By 5.13.14
Automated Postal Centers (APCs) are kiosks that are available when post office lines are too long, the service counter is closed, or you want to avoid bothersome human interaction. They’re set up very much like ATMs that print postage instead of dispensing cash. Like any other machine that accepts debit cards and is accessible to the public, APCs have been the target of card-skimming scammers. [More]
My Post Office Stacks Mailed Packages On Lobby Floor, Shrugs
By 2.3.14
Reader C. visited the post office recently, and what he saw upset him. The good news was that his post office was doing brisk business. It was early in the morning still, but it received a lot of packages. The bad news was that these packages were piled on the floor in the lobby. [More]
Insider Holiday Mailing Advice From A U.S. Postal Service Worker
By 12.10.13 — Updated: 11.29.16
The United States Postal Service shared some useful holiday mailing tips with us a few weeks ago, with some sensible suggestions to help you get your packages to their destinations faster and with a minimum of fuss. An anonymous postal worker complimented that list, but told us that she had some additions of her own: insights that can only come from behind the counter. [More]
