You’re going to call me crazy for expecting anything else, but the United States Postal Service just confuses me to no end. Of the hundred and fifty holiday cards I sent out (yes, by snail mail… call me old-fashioned), I’ve already received four of them back with incorrect addresses.
One of them was from Australia and while the address was correct, the house was new and the owners had not yet installed a mail box out front. Okay, fair enough.
Three of the returned cards were from the United States. One of them has a sticker that says “Return to sender – attempted to forward, address not known.” Again, fair enough. The recipient of the card (Mr. Niwano!) has not informed me of an address change so what can I expect the USPS to do?
(There’s a whole other blog entry on the topic of letting people know in this digital age when your snail mail address has changed.)
But two of the returned cards really confused me:
The first card, the sticker tells me that the forwarding time has expired, but helpfully lists the new address, which is in the same postal code.
Checking with Google maps, it seems that the new address is exactly 2.3 miles form the old address. So, in their infinite financial wisdom, the United States Postal Service decided to return the card about 7,934 miles (by the great circle route) rather than forward it to an address they have, 2.3 miles away.
The second card, the stamp tells me that they are unable to forward the card. It seems that I’ve transposed two digits in the house number. How do I know. Because some postal employee crossed out the incorrect number (4305) and wrote the correct number (4035). Then sent it back to me.
Again looking at Google maps, it seems that the recipient’s street is only one block long, so it isn’t like the postal employee had to walk two blocks to deliver it. He or she already knew the correct address but couldn’t be troubled to deliver it there!
You tell me, please, what exactly I’m getting for my 42 cents.
christao408 
150 greeting cards, wow. I do not think I have mailed that many over all my years, and you did it every year. That is over $60 in stamps alone? impressive. I tend to send emails instead. USPS have no logic at all, and confused me also. They have certain way to do things, and no one can tell them to do things differently. Totally without common “cents” or 42 cents.
150 cards – how admirable. Odd… maybe there’s some bureaucratic rule somewhere that is preventing some employee from becoming empowered.
non-cents
That should be the working culture on this side of the world…..here in Canada – at least Vancouver – is the same and as what stevew918 has said ‘no one can tell them to do thins differently’
150 cards? WOW you are the Christmas Card angel, hands down. I will stop being so stingy about Christmas cards from now on. I sent out e-cards to the majority and only a cards to a handful of people. they should have just delivered it. i would have.
it’s $.42 cents to mail from thailand?
BTW, that’s how they keep the postal business going
oi 42 cents?! wow…anyways yeah… things that make you go hmmm…
Ugh, I wish I had an answer! They confuse me as well. You would think by now that they would have a good system in place. Yeesh.
I wonder: Is this why postal rates continue to go up?
Benjamin Franklin just turned in his grave.
The girl who wrote a song for xichun earthquake before finally plugging her first, pls give her a little support : )
http://hk.youtube.com/watch?v=TCLKHoY-ywQ
postcard for only 42cents is possible ya! perhaps USPS needs to use GPS to control its postal businessanyway happy new year =)
postcard for only 42cents is possible ya! perhaps USPS needs to use GPS to control its postal businessanyway happy new year =)
postcard for only 42cents is possible ya! perhaps USPS needs to use GPS to control its postal businessanyway happy new year =)
I’m not taking sides, but…. It seems that they were 100% accurate on all cards where the name and address matched. And for those of us in the witness protection program it is very important that the name we’re given matches the address were are located. Also at the salary of postal employees, spending more than 2 minutes deciding what to do with one piece of mail would ultimately cost more than sending it back. We got your card 🙂
Chris is such a X’mas card angel! Thank you since mine was delivered right on. By the way, I had visited a Thai post office (along Sukumvit?) a few times before, and would not give it too much faith…but got my stuff delivered anyhow!
@Wangium – No, I use a service called sendoutcards.com that allows me to write and send cards from the US. Kind of cool service – I even created a font in my own handwriting!
@stevew918 – @ElusiveWords – @XXKimPossibleXX – @curry69curry – Well, it may seem like a lot of cards but there’s a lot of nice people I know and I think a card or letter arriving in the mail box – such a rare thing in a day when it is only bills and unsolicited advertisements – is a special treat. I know I enjoy receiving them, so I assume others do, too.
The postal service here is just as bad.
@christao408 – oh yes definitely….cards and hand-written notes or letters are such a rare treat these days. I love receiving them. Good Job!
@runaheadofme – Haha. non-cents. Cute. :o)
I guess this explains why US is in recession! They simply don’t think when they work.