Why the Post Office is doomed

[Guest nicemac]

Every company has problems, and it is frustrating as heck when something you are waiting on gets caught in the black hole. I guarantee there are just as many problems with Fed Ex and UPS deliveries.

As a postal employee, I take pride in my job, most of us do. Like any other company there will always be a percentage of employees who really don't give a crap. Sad, but it is a fact.

I also challege you to do a little independent research on the post office finances before jumping on to the "We have to bail them out" train. The post office has been required to prefund retirees health care and benefits since 1970. No other company or government acency has to do this. Currently this account has been over funded by 75 Billion dollars. Since 2006, we have been required by congress to prefund at the rate of 5.6 billion a year! It would seem simple to let us use some of the money in that fund to offset expenses, right? Unfortunately, all that money goes into the governments general fund, and it seems to have been spent by our elected officials!

I use FedEx and UPS daily (as well as USPS). They have nowhere near the problems that the Post Office does. They have the ability to fire employees who slack off and do a crummy job. I have a sister who has worked in HR for UPS for 25 years. Believe me UPS fires people…

[tnhawk]

Did the USPS have anything to say about this absurdity?

USPS has had years to try to get shipping correct, do you want them having anything to do with healthcare?

[Guest nicemac]

Did the USPS have anything to say about this absurdity?

The Post Office in Arrington swears the package never entered their building–despite tracking info to the contrary. Of course this is the same Post Office that "closes" at 4PM, but sometimes when you arrive at 3:45, the doors are locked and there is nobody there…

We already got a replacement from Amazon (which has terrific C/S, btw), so now this is just entertainment!

[BryanP]

UPS and FedEx both have their own special problems, but yeah, the USPS is a lot of fun. I have a vaguely similar situation right now - UPS did their version of the same thing and dropped off a package at the Nashville post office last Wednesday. You'd think it could make its way to Smyrna by now.

[Gun Smith]

We all know what the phrase "going postal" means these days. Wonder why we don't ever hear the phrase "going UPS" or "going FedEx" in the same context?

[Links2k]

Every company has problems, and it is frustrating as heck when something you are waiting on gets caught in the black hole. I guarantee there are just as many problems with Fed Ex and UPS deliveries.

As a postal employee, I take pride in my job, most of us do. Like any other company there will always be a percentage of employees who really don't give a crap. Sad, but it is a fact.

I also challege you to do a little independent research on the post office finances before jumping on to the "We have to bail them out" train. The post office has been required to prefund retirees health care and benefits since 1970. No other company or government acency has to do this. Currently this account has been over funded by 75 Billion dollars. Since 2006, we have been required by congress to prefund at the rate of 5.6 billion a year! It would seem simple to let us use some of the money in that fund to offset expenses, right? Unfortunately, all that money goes into the governments general fund, and it seems to have been spent by our elected officials!

I was wondering if anyone was going to mention this. Everyone thinks that the Postal Service is an government entity and starts piling on. As long as the P.O. has to prefund those accounts it will be screwed. The future does not look good, because there is no way in hell that the government is giving that money back out of the general fund.

[Guest nicemac]

UPDATE

Left Southaven on 12/8, arrived in Atlanta on 12/13. Left Atlanta 12/14. Arrived back in Southaven THE SAME DAY (Excellent service!). Left Southaven at 12:15 AM today. Not sure where it is headed now. Atlanta maybe?

[Guest coldblackwind]

Not to defend the post office, but I do have to mention at this point that I once had fedex drop one of my packages off 6 miles from my house! Luckily the guy found my number and called me, still haven't figured that one out, names weren't vaguely the same, nor were the addresses. Oh well, at least it was the right road in the right town!

[Oh Shoot]

Several packages I sent, and several sent to me, over the last two weeks, are not getting scanned either at source or delivery end and two have shown no tracking info at all from pickup through delivery. Either the database has gone wonky or they're just not getting scanned.

- OS

[kieefer]

UPDATE

Left Southaven on 12/8, arrived in Atlanta on 12/13. Left Atlanta 12/14. Arrived back in Southaven THE SAME DAY (Excellent service!). Left Southaven at 12:15 AM today. Not sure where it is headed now. Atlanta maybe?

Hilarious, what size a package is it?

[Just2Honor]

Just got an Amazon order that the FedEx Smartpost tracing shows took 2 days to get to my local PO from Kansas and then another 2 days to get to me six miles away. Now I'm not complaining about the 4 days, but I think the 2 days to get across town may be the issue with the PO.

[Oh Shoot]

One of my mystery packages I sent 3 days ago just showed up:

Processed through USPS Sort Facility, December 15, 2011, 8:43 pm, ZIP Code 38199

38199 is NOT a valid zipcode. Looks like it may have been used in Memphis once upon a time, but is no longer valid, even according to USPS.

Also, gave a package to my mail lady today, who sorta knows me, asked whether I had come to get a long package that was brought back to station (bought a couple of old fly rods). She had just happened to notice it left there by guy who did her route the other day. I had gotten no notice, either in my mailbox or on door that they had tried to deliver it. And whichever one it is, no clue, since the tracking numbers for both of them are are not showing any progress at all.

- OS

Edited December 16, 2011 by OhShoot

[kb4ns]

Processed through USPS Sort Facility, December 15, 2011, 8:43 pm, ZIP Code 38199

38199 is NOT a valid zipcode.

38199 is the big sort facility in Memphis.

[Oh Shoot]

38199 is the big sort facility in Memphis.

Apparently they don't even rent po boxes with that zip though. I just sorta wanted to know if it got out of town at some point, seems USPS could at least mention that it is a Memphis zipcode. 'Course it never showed as scanned in Knoxville at all. This is USPS lookup utility, btw.

- OS

[robin48]

38199 is the big sort facility in Memphis.

And where a lot of stuff gets "lost"

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

[kb4ns]

Apparently they don't even rent po boxes with that zip though.

Nope. The sort facility is just a sort facility. Not even open to the public.

And where a lot of stuff gets "lost"

Yep!

[chemprof]

I use FedEx and UPS daily (as well as USPS). They have nowhere near the problems that the Post Office does. They have the ability to fire employees who slack off and do a crummy job. I have a sister who has worked in HR for UPS for 25 years. Believe me UPS fires people…

Perhaps any carriers on here could verify some info I "heard." I was told second-hand that there is a "No Firing" policy with the management level within USPS. Is this true?

[VERO1]

Usually they just get reassigned to another office or district. Many are to stupid to pour pee out of a boot. This opens up another whole can of why the post office is in so much trouble!

[Guest dubaholic2]

im in kind of a similar situation. i ordered some fishing lures back in september and im still waiting on them through USPS. i also ordered a couple mags for my sp2009 around the first of november and i havent recieved those either. i have never had this happen before, but anything else i order im going to request be sent ups or fedex. this is absolutely rediculous.

[Erik88]

Several months ago I sold a holster on another forum. I mailed it off to the buyer in Arizona and didn't think much about it. About 7-10 days later the guys sends me a message saying he still has not received the holster. I eventually ended up refunding him his money after about 2 weeks. He was a really nice guy and very patient.

About 2 months after that I get a random message from him stating that he finally got the holster in the mail. Apparently it was lost for a long time.

[Guest Field Boss]

And they are being paid as if they were skilled.

[Caster]

UPS is equally stupid. Tracking my latest Midway order. From Missouri to fairview, guess where the first stop is.....knoxville. *sigh*morons. According to tracking they took 12 hours to truck it to knoxville when they COULD have put in on a nashville bound truck, or better yet to the Cool Springs hub. No, that would have made too much sense.

[Guest bkelm18]

And they are being paid as if they were skilled.

I'm sure many would take exception to that.

[Guest midnitelamp]

Fairly common knowledge that Ben Franklin was the first postmaster general.

He had two goals: Balance the books and making the clerks feel their jobs were important. Seeing soon enough that this was impossible,he decided to move on with his life.

Ben had a plain faced dull witted daughter[just your speed straight jacket] that he could not get out of the house. He saw a young man coming a Richard Bache who soon married his daughter and to keep her in the style she had became accustomed to,gave him his job as postmaster.

Thus started a pattern of nepotism and evidently inbred idiocy the Postal Service has yet to recover from.

[sigbrown1297]

I try to avoid USPS. Especially parcel post. Priority mail isn't that bad. I ordered something from Atlanta GA on the 12th. It got processed to Memphis and has been sitting there since the 14th and hasn't moved. Est. delivery date was supposed to be the 19th.

Unfortunately, USPS was the only shipping option from this company.