For all those times you sat by the window, admiring the mailman’s way with long shorts and tall socks, the United States Postal Service is here for you, finally. The agency announced it’s looking for new ways to make money while it struggles financially, and that includes a new clothing line it’s planning. [More]
USPS
Post Office Announces End Of Saturday Delivery, 63% Of Americans Shrug
By 2.13.13
Despite the fact that some Netflix DVD subscribers will be put out, a new Gallup poll shows that for the most part, Americans are in favor of the U.S. Postal Service’s plan to terminate Saturday mail delivery. The survey showed that 63% of Americans are in favor of ending Saturday mail as a way for the USPS to help fix its financial woes. [More]
United States Postal Service Dropping Saturday Mail Delivery Starting Aug. 1
By 2.6.13
Your mailbox is going to feel a bit empty starting next summer, as the United States Postal Service is going to cut Saturday delivery in a move designed to save the agency $2 billion a year. Partly because it didn’t want to continue waiting around for Congress to do something to help dig it out of its financial hole, beginning Aug. 1 the weekends will be mail-free, although packages will still be delivered on Saturdays. [More]
My Landlord Raises Rent 1 Penny To Make Up For Postage Increases, Sends Letter To Tell Me
By 2.5.13
As you may have noticed, the price of stamps went up last week by an entire penny. Overall, the nation seems to be coping pretty well, unless they’re small businesses who have a lot of overseas customers. (Air mail prices went up, too. A lot.) One entity that isn’t coping well is reader Layla’s apartment complex. They’ve raised everyone’s rent one penny to compensate for the postage change, and chose to notify everyone by… delivering a letter to their doors. [More]
My W-2 Arrives Ripped Open, Only Tax Cat And I Care
By 1.28.13
Ultimately, we’re all responsible for our own fates. That’s what David learned when an important tax document arrived in his mailbox with his Social Security number and name exposed. It didn’t come in a “sorry we damaged your mail” envelope like most mangled letters do, so he was suspicious. Maybe someone had ripped it open to get his info. Maybe a postal employee had mangled it, but forgot to put it in an apologetic envelope. Whatever had happened, surely the postal service, credit bureaus, and police would have answers for him, right? Right. [More]
Cash-Strapped USPS Raising The Price Of A Stamp By A Penny Starting Sunday
By 1.25.13
It’s a brand new year but already the cash-strained United States Postal Service is showing that it’s feeling the financial heat that kept zapping it in 2012. Starting on Sunday, the price of a first-class stamp will go from $0.45 to $0.46 as we were warned last year. Post card stamps will also rise a penny to $0.33. Sure, it’s only a penny, but it’s a penny you don’t have to pay on Saturday that you do on Sunday. [More]
U.S. Postal Service Sends My Priority Mail Package 1,688 Miles Out Of Its Way
By 1.23.13
Tän ordered something on eBay from a vendor who was right in the same metropolitan area. How long can it take for the U.S. Postal Service to transport a package fifteen miles? Eleven days, evidently. Which wouldn’t be so bad if the seller hadn’t used Priority Mail: you know, that service which is supposed to take two or three days to get things across the country, not just across town. [More]
Court: GameFly Is Right — Netflix Shouldn’t Be Getting Special Treatment From The USPS
By 1.11.13
GameFly has once again scored a win in its years-long crusade to prove that the U.S. Postal Service is treating Netflix like the popular girl while it had to pay out the nose for similar treatment. A federal appeals court ruled today that Netflix had an unfair advantage because it didn’t have to pay a penny to have its envelopes sorted by hand instead of machine, while GameFly was subject to hefty surcharges for the same treatment. [More]
Hundreds Of FedEx Packages Missing After Driver Kicks Them Out Of His Truck
By 12.17.12
If you live in the area of Papillion, Nebraska, and you’ve been waiting on a FedEx package for a couple weeks now, you’re not alone, after a driver for the delivery service decided to simply dump hundreds of parcels in the road. [More]
Insider Explains Why FedEx SmartPost Is So Terrible
By 11.21.12
The overwhelming crappiness of FedEx Smartpost as a shipping method is a frequent topic around here. But why is it so terrible? We could have guessed that a partnership between ostensible rivals FedEx and the U.S. Postal Service might not work so well, but one reader with inside knowledge about why it’s so terrible reached out and shared their knowledge with us. The basic reason? The labels are terrible, and confuse the equipment. [More]
FedEx SmartPost Package Takes A Week To Tour Southern California, Tantalizingly Near My House
By 11.13.12
Tim’s new shirt from Teefury didn’t have to go very far. It just had to make a short trip across the Los Angeles hypermetroplex. But somehow the eventual delivery service that is FedEx SmartPost couldn’t get the package to go in a straight line, which meant that it took a meandering route around the area. Really, they could have put the shirt in a cardboard tube and rolled it to Tim faster. [More]
My eBay Package Took An Exciting Vacation In Memphis
By 10.29.12
Reader Chris won an eBay auction, and the seller just happened to live about a mile away from him. He asked if he could stop by to pick it up, but the seller mailed it instead. So the package went to the town’s post office, then right back out to Chris’s house, right? Wrong. They sent it more than 1,300 miles total, to Memphis, TN and back. [More]
USPS Reaches The Limit Of $15 Billion Borrowed From Treasury, Is All Like, “Now What?”
By 10.17.12
We feel kind of bad for the U.S. Postal Service these days. Here it is, this important part of American life that has provided a service we relied on heavily for hundreds of years before the Internet, and here it is limping along broke and basically friendless. And now it’s borrowed all the money it’s allowed to, $15 billion, from the only place it’s allowed to borrow from, the U.S. Treasury. Sigh. [More]
Stock Up On Forever Stamps Right Now: USPS Increasing Stamp Prices By A Penny In 2013
By 10.12.12
In the midst of continuing struggles to fork over billions in defaulted payments, the United States Postal Service is tightening purse strings and generally doing anything it can to ride this budget problem out. An upcoming retrenchment will hit customers right where it hurts the most next year — the wallet. Stamps for letters will go up a penny to $0.46 starting Jan. 27, while postcard stamps will increase a cent to $0.33. [More]
U.S. Postal Service Re-Enacts Seinfeld Episode, Delivers All June Mail On October 1
By 10.5.12
Jason didn’t say whether his mail carrier’s name happens to be Newman, but he was pretty surprised to receive most of his mail from June on October 1st. That’s understandable. Usually you’d expect to receive that stuff at least by the end of July. If it were just ad flyers, he wouldn’t be annoyed, but the giant bundle of misdirected mail contained important things like bills. Good thing he wasn’t expecting any checks. [More]
USPS Defaults On Another $5.6 Billion Payment But Assures Customers It’ll Be Business As Usual
By 10.1.12
The United States Postal Service warned this would happen and it did — it defaulted on another $5.6 billion payment to its future retiree benefits account. It’s the second default by the agency in two months, and the USPS says it’s because Congress failed to act. Despite those woes, the USPS assures customers that business will go on as usual. [More]
How Is FedEx SmartPost So Freaking Slow?
By 7.28.11 — Updated: 12.3.12
J. likes ordering from Woot, but hates FedEx SmartPost, the company’s shipping method of choice. Describing it as “some sort of misbegotten bastard child of FedEx and the US Postal Service,” J. calculates that it would actually be faster to travel from Woot HQ in Texas to his home on Brooklyn by bicycle. Which would be helpful if he weren’t ordering inanimate objects. [More]
Where To Complain About The Postal Service
By 1.31.11 — Updated: 5.6.15
A lot of times when people complain about the postal service they can find that calling up their local post office is an exercise in futility. Assuming they get through to anyone, they can find the person on the other end of the line lackadaisical or difficult to understand. If this happens to you, you don’t have to just cry into your Beanie Baby collection. [More]
