Just a bit of a rant on the US Post Office of today!

kshansen

XS650 Guru
Top Contributor
Messages
1,655
Reaction score
7,457
Points
513
Location
Central NY USA
On May 25, 2021 I ordered a pair of 6204-2RS ball bearings from a bearing house in Medley FL. For anyone not familiar with ball bearing sizes they are about the size of an Oreo Double Stuff cookie! I started tracking them on the 26th of May when Post Office showed they had possession of the package.

About a week ago I called local Post Office to see if they could wake someone up to see where they might be. Lady said she sent a couple emails out and a couple days later the package moved from Tenn. Post Office and then to Rochester NY Post Office and finally made it to my local Post Office this morning!

I just happened to be outside when mail truck came down the road so I met the mailman at the end of drive he said hope that is the package you are waiting for with the two bearings! It was. He said he has the same problems getting the license plates he collects and buys on Ebay. 18 days just to move a small package appox. 1,500 miles! That is double the time it took me to get a similar size package from here to Winnipeg Canada and that one had to be cleared through customs!
 
And then I told him “ It should be there by Friday! Hahahahaha!”
FDBD0AD9-9ADE-485B-9D20-402F18B1E65F.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Imagine rerouting day old chicks from a hatchery.......might eventually get pullets if'n their fed and watered along the way.

Ive delivered chickens a bunch of times! :) One time we had a load of grown roosters come into our office, it was funny to hear them all crowing while we were sorting mail. :laugh2:
 
Was contracted to the USPS back when they had their own airplanes. Opened the fwd cargo hold one morning and about a gazillion chicks started jumping ship.... their containers busted open. Too bad it was before the day of camera phones. The sight of a hand full of rampies, 3 pilots and a mechanic "herding" baby chicks on a busy ramp prolly looked hilarious. :lmao:
 
I've had a few package delays, but the problems were resolved promptly after I reported them on the USPS site. Everybody who's kept an eye on the news over the last year or so knows that the USPS was deliberately sabotaged. IMO the folks with their boots on the ground at USPS have done an amazing job in the face of adversity, and my hat's off to them. Can't help wondering why Louis DeJoy still has his job.
 
IMO the folks with their boots on the ground at USPS have done an amazing job in the face of adversity, and my hat's off to them.
AGREED! Just the same, I prefer to deal with businesses that give me the UPS or FedEx shipping option. I want parts in three days, not three weeks. Likewise, businesses that wait a week to handoff a package. Unless they tell me up front that they ship on Tuesday and Friday, I expect my box out the door by next business day. USPS has been very good about getting my stuff here.....eventually.
 
You wouldn’t believe the effort that the Post Office made to insure timely deliver of Priority Mail parcels when I worked there. There were all sorts of delivery standards and performance of such was a matter of record. Management pay raises used to be merit based and one of the criteria they had to hit was delivery standards being met.
Those standards were thrown out the window by current top management and in its place, hitting budget targets, and controlling work hours became priority number one. When I was a mailman, nobody left the office to go to the street until all first class mail had been sorted and loaded on the trucks. But now they hit a certain time and it’s everybody out of the office, just go, whether you have all the mail or not. Keeping employees to a strict 8 hr. day became the rule. It’s sad really, what should be a public service that people can rely on, has become a money driven business instead.
 
a public service that people can rely on, has become a money driven business instead.
It's my understanding that it still bleeds money anyway. One day, probably sooner than later, the U.S. will become another country with no postal service. At least, that's what I expect to happen and it's my own opinion.
 
It's my understanding that it still bleeds money anyway. One day, probably sooner than later, the U.S. will become another country with no postal service. At least, that's what I expect to happen and it's my own opinion.

It does, and you’re right, we will probably have a privatized mail service eventually. Which would probably be ok for large cities. But don’t think for a minute that any privately run mail service will deliver to sparcely populated rural areas. There’s not enough money in it.
Here’s the other thing I’ve never understood. The Postal Service is a federal agency that provides a necessary service. We were always expected to be a financially self sustaining agency through the sale of postage and shipping products. And that worked brilliantly for a hundred years. Before the advent of the internet , the Post Office was the cash cow of the federal government, we were the only government agency that made money. In fact we made so much money that they would take all the profit we generated and use it to prop up programs such as Social Security. The post office is by law a non profit agency, we are supposed to break even. Nobody ever complained when we made too much money. :cautious:
So here comes the internet, and first class mail volume starts dropping, slowly at first but it’s like a snowball rolling downhill. And keep in mind that at the same time our income is declining we are still trying to keep up with technology and installing new mail sorting machinery, delivery trucks , new Post Office buildings in cities that are growing. We still had to grow and improve to keep up with demands.
So here’s what drives me crazy. It was ok to expect us to be financially self sufficient when it was possible for us to do so. But belt tightening will only get you so far. The income is drying up and to keep berating the Post Office as some antiquated inefficient organization is just unfair. ( I’m not talking about you Marty , I’m talking about bureaucrats) At some point the government needs to decide if they think having a functional mail system is a service they want to provide, and if so, then quit beating us up and fund us, like you do every single other federal agency and the military. The USPS still generates a substantial amount of income ( again the only federal agency to do so! ) just keep what they earn and subsidize the rest.
Ok I’ll get down off my soap box now. Once a mailman always a mailman.
0E1577F6-5A5F-4EA0-9B6A-F12FA33391A1.jpeg Taken on my last day carrying mail. :)
 
But don’t think for a minute that any privately run mail service will deliver to sparcely populated rural areas. There’s not enough money in it.
I know that FedEx uses USPS for last mile in remote places. I expect other private carriers do the same. So, if USPS goes away, it's no surprise to me that many folks end up with nothing. Getting packages will be very spendy for some. Otherwise, the service is provided at a loss and only the gov't can do that.
 
The post office is using neighborhood mail and parcel lockers, there are many private provider's of similar service. No longer have to hitch up the mule to get to town. even shut in's mostly have care takers that are in town daily.
Canada post does not pick up mail from private boxes only delivers.
If management, congress, and unions agreed to infrastructure improvements PO could make a good money on small parcels.
At least they are going to replace the route vehicles.
https://www.theverge.com/2021/2/23/...service-mail-truck-electric-oshkosh-workhorse
 
Last edited:
Hey @Mailman bet you still DREAM about delivering mail, well dream is a euphemism.
I was only there 7 years and still wake up in a sweat after a nightmare of trying to sort and deliver a route I didn't know.

It’s funny you say that. I have that same nightmare, being on a route I don’t know and being pushed for time. Isn’t that weird? I’ve been retired for 3 1/2 years and I haven’t carried mail for over 13 years. And of all the different jobs I’ve held, that’s the only one I have dreams about! o_O I used to work with a mail carrier that spent years as a bartender on the “Lido” deck of a big cruise ship and he said he still had dreams of doing that job. :cool:

I saw that article on the new electric trucks. I hope they work. :laugh2: The LLV vehicles that the Post Office still uses all over the country , they were brand new when I started carrying mail, they were supposed to last 18 years, that was almost 30 years ago! They have an all aluminum body made by Grumman the aircraft manufacturer. The body is all held together by rivets. Built on a Chevy S-10 pickup chassis. They just keep swapping in new parts.
 
I have a very similar nightmare from time to time, about being out there in the dark still delivering mail. I have been retired for over 6 years. Through my time I watched the same letter carrier depot evolve from a one supervisor, with no computer, and very few sick days taken into a nightmare of 4 supervisors, each with their own computer, and forced overtime from all the sick time being taken. It seems like over 28 years technology did not make the job any easier.
 
Who could possibly believe that the former CEO of New Breed Logistics would have a vested interest in destroying the USPS? DeJoy is Postmaster General exactly because he's committed to eliminating the USPS and leaving us at the mercy of private carriers. The bright side of the picture is that he'll probably be an involuntary guest at Uncle Sam's Grey Bar Motel soon for shaking down his employees for contributions to favored politicians. He'll make some upstanding con a fine wife.
 
Guess I need to add that I was not trying to berate the rank and file workers of the Post Office. As in 90% of the organizations I have dealt with in close to 70 years I feel the most problems are created by those at or very near the top. Those people who even if they once worked at the bottom levels have long forgot what it takes to do a job!
 
Back
Top