No mail delivery for a week - Charlottesville

[Yonnie3]

Other people in Charlottesville say their mail delivery has been OK. Any local DUer's in the area getting their mail OK?

We had a pile of mail put in our box Tuesday (7/18) and only one was addressed to us and about ten items were not addressed to us. I bundled them with a note saying they were wrongly delivered and put the flag up on the box. The flag is still up.

I do see a mail truck come through the neighborhood after dark and the carrier seems to be delivering parcels, so hopefully my neighbors are getting their prescriptions.

Senator Warner has pushed the USPS to do better on several occasions. The latest I am aware of was in April. https://www.nbc29.com/2022/04/14/sen-warner-is-back-charlottesville-push-usps-delays/

The post office doesn't ever answer the phone and the counter workers will not go in back and search a weeks worth of mail to find yours.

I did the only thing I could figure out to do and filed out a contact on Sen. Warner's website asking him to push some more.

If they don't have enough employees I don't see why they don't schedule the carriers to work alternating days on different routes instead of letting a single route have no service. Typically a carrier has a regular route so I'm wondering if they can refuse another route? We haven't had a regular carrier since well before the pandemic, so this is nothing new. Now that there is a week's backlog of unsorted mail it will take significant manpower to catch up.

Edit to add: I did redeliver the mail addressed to houses on my block. Some of the letters were to a vacant house that I'm certain that the former resident has filed a change of address form.

[Nululu]

1. Sign up for USPS informed delivery.

It's on the USPS website and shows when mail and packages are supposed to be delivered. Can be emailed daily or as often as mail comes.

This way you see when things should be coming.

https://www.usps.com/manage/informed-delivery.htm

[Yonnie3]

2. well ...

I know folks who say they use informed delivery and they now know all the mail they have sitting in the post office. The counter employees at the post office will not go search the unsorted mail to get the mail for them.

Knowing what is not delivered is no help in getting it delivered. I suppose one could call the mailing party to ask what they sent.

[Wonder Why]

3. Contact the Postal Inspector's office with evidence from the emails

and file a theft charge against the local office.

Postal Inspector Web Site

[Butterflylady]

4. Love Informed Mail.

Lets me know what is coming so I know whether I have to downstairs to get the mail. Also great to know what packages are coming since I order a lot from amazon.

[Postal Grunt]

5. There's no easy solution..

There's no easy solution to your problem. The USPS is having trouble retaining new employees. The job that people used to wait for months or even a couple years, as I did, isn't all that desirable anymore. Most letter carriers these days start off as essentially disposable temps with no benefits or job security and relatively low pay even though management expects them to perform at the same level and with the same dedication to the job as a regular carrier. The letter carriers union, the National Association of Letter Carriers, has been trying to help remedy the service problems but they have to deal with a management structure that has long been captivated by numbers rather than satisfying customers.

Regular carriers are assigned to the same route on a daily basis through contractual agreements. It makes sense because these days a route can easily have more than 700 individual stops or delivery points to deal with. While most mail is machine sorted, the carrier is still expected to know who is whom on their routes and not misdeliver a single piece of mail. That's easy to say for a manager but sometimes difficult to do since approximately 25% of Americans are moving somewhere every year. Try to imagine keeping a couple hundred change of address orders straight in your head along with their family members for at least six months on top of the existing deliveries. It's difficult enough for a regular but an impossible task for the sub who is criticized by customers and management alike.

Obviously, the solution carriers would suggest is to hire more career/full time carriers who are assigned regular routes or to relieve the regular carrier on her/his scheduled day off. Management has long said that they have to manage using overtime to see that every day's mail is delivered on the day it is received at the station so someone will get their mail late or not at the expected time. Increased automation was expected to minimize overtime and increase accuracy of delivery but it's easy to see that it hasn't and isn't fulfilling projected expectations. Despite their fevered protestations that they can't hire more career carriers due to long term costs of employees, falling utilization rates of the many services offered should be but isn't accepted as a warning sign that they're wrong. Most management has little to no regular contact with everyday customers. They can't recognize and solve problems until they meet their customers face to face.

The expected UPS strike will shine a light on the USPS and it probably won't be a pretty sight. Customers who are presently using UPS will turn to FedEx and the USPS for shipping. The difference is that the USPS is required by law to accept all mail and deliver to every street address six days a week. There will be overtime, there will be frustrated customers, and there will be tired carriers working in what is expected to some of the worst heat related conditions of the summer. I'm glad to be a retired carrier because I've been there and done that.

[Yonnie3]

6. It's indeed a no win situation right now

I've seen news stories about the local USPS going to job fairs to recruit. They have many people who show interest and zero actually apply.

I took the postal service test in the early 70s and received job offers as a temporary employee with low wages and no benefits. My off the record advice from a postmaster was only take the job if I wanted to make the Postal Service a long career. It might take years as a temp employee until an opening would be available for a benefited position and better salary. I took a low wage job at the University with full benefits instead.

I've heard from two ex-carriers about middle management here being unwilling to do anything to make the job easier and seem to think their job is just to write up underlings.

Adequate funding, new technology, and better management would help solve our problems but the hole they are in is deep so there are no quick fixes.

Today I took the pile of mail incorrectly delivered to us and walked several blocks to place mail in the correct addressee's boxes. I still have ones that need to go back to the PO for forwarding or are for other streets.

[Midnight Writer]

7. No regular carrier is probably key to your problem.

It means no one is responsible.

A regular carrier knows his route, knows his customers (even if they don't know him), and knows that any foul-ups or complaints on his/her route can be traced directly to them.

Postal management has adopted the policy of using employees as interchangeable parts, putting them on different routes (often bringing in carriers from other offices) every day, and not filling route vacancies, holding up assignments for years.

Under Reagan, it was decided to make the USPS "run more like a business" than like a public service. That means cutting costs, cutting workers, cutting quality, cutting corners, and cutting service.

The way a manager advances in the Postal Service is by having a reputation for cost-cutting, which translates to job-cutting.