Unites States Postal Service (USPS) Nitemare

[Jim Oaks]

On December 16th I shipped a package full of Christmas presents and some homemade cookies from Texas to my son and daughter-in-law in Pennsylvania.

That package went to Fort Worth, Dallas, Indianapolis, Chicago, and ended up back in Dallas on Christmas day. Then it went to Coppell TX and today arrived back in Fort Worth trying to find its way to Pennsylvania.

It's been 13-days and the package isn't even close to arriving.

I mailed a Christmas package to my mom in Ohio at the same time I shipped my sons package, and my mom got hers on the 21st.

 

[Jazzer]

Here’s why;

Column: Remember Louis DeJoy? He's still in charge of the Postal Service, but why?

Louis DeJoy hasn't been fired yet as postmaster general. Why the delay?

www.latimes.com

I’ve switched all my bill pays to online because apparently, according to the PO, my Mastercard payment address and in a separate occurrence, my own address, do not exist.

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

I had a similar experience with USPS here. Shipped from Rockauto Tuesday. Arrived in Calgary depot following week Monday. Out for delivery Tuesday. Back to depot for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Delivered Saturday. If I hadn't phoned in (1.5 hours both times) on both Thursday and Friday, I doubt they would have delivered Saturday.
I think its because they use independent contractors for the "last mile".

 

[Robertmangrum.rm]

Yeah this has been going on for a while. Back when I ordered my cariar bearing, it took almost 6 weeks to get. It was shipped.from Atlanta to Nashville, basically 4 hours away. Well as I tracked it. It.went to Michigan then to Illinois then to Tennessee. I could have drive down and got it and back the same day. Just doesn't make sense to me.

 

[tw205]

Knowing they are an extention of the United States government, and said government has never done anything with efficincy or accuracy. The question is, why would anyone rely on such a failed entity with any expectation of success. Most likely some diabetic bloated sack ate your cookies and some meth or heroin addict pawned your Christmas presents. If they actually ever reach their destination, it truely would be a Christmas miracle.

 

[dvdswan]

I understand your pain, this year we sent out cards and gifts on the 5th. Cards arrived on the 23rd and the gifts arrived on the 21st via OH going to FL. Last year the gifts went thru Puerto Rico before heading to FL.

 

[JoshT]

Yeah this has been going on for a while. Back when I ordered my cariar bearing, it took almost 6 weeks to get. It was shipped.from Atlanta to Nashville, basically 4 hours away. Well as I tracked it. It.went to Michigan then to Illinois then to Tennessee. I could have drive down and got it and back the same day. Just doesn't make sense to me.

Yeah that PMG POS DeJoy stood up a new Regional Processing & Distribution Center near Atlanta (Palmetto) this year and royally fucked up the mail service in the state. Basically all mail in the state that leaves the local post office goes through this center. Apparently rather than phasing from the old facility to the new one (which uses completely different processes) they completely shut down the old one before bringing the new one online. Not even a proper trial run before bringing it online. If I'm remembering what I read/heard correctly the new facility is much more automated and none of it is working right. In addition the facility doesn't have the capacity to handle the throughput aimed at it. Maybe it could handle it if things were running at 100%, but not with all of the teething issues. I recall news stories from earlier in the year talking about how the transport trucks were backed up enough to cause traffic issues for surrounding businesses and community due to waiting to drop loads at the facility. Eventually they stopped rreporting on it, because people got tired of hearing about it, not because it got fixed.

Hopefully fixing these problems are on the next administration's to-do list. Definitely seems like something that the DOGE could take a look at.

 

[Curious Hound]

I don't want to comment since my mail hasn't been too bad lately. I don't understand why Amszon uses them for some deliveries. If Amazon was smart, they'd steer clear of USPS.

 

[Brain75]

When I lived in Austin I got no more than approx. 1/3 of the stuff that was actually addressed to me - I just flat switched everything to online since I knew I would never get it and went to only buying from amazon with delivery to an amazon box at the grocery store.

Back in CO, I get 99% of the stuff I order, the only thing that failed was a strong neodymium magnet that I ordered from china and they did not package it properly (simply baggie is all they did)... of course it magnetized to a belt, jammed the machine, tore open the baggie and spewed contents.. Refund on it all, cause all I ever got was an open, ripped, empty bag.

One thing that went from China to US that took a holy wow route (99% just goes plane to LAX, then semi to my door), was some thermal paste for electronics that went through Tanzania, full refund on that cause it took more than 90 days to get to me.

 

[Bill]

Knowing they are an extention of the United States government, and said government has never done anything with efficincy or accuracy. The question is, why would anyone rely on such a failed entity with any expectation of success. Most likely some diabetic bloated sack ate your cookies and some meth or heroin addict pawned your Christmas presents. If they actually ever reach their destination, it truely would be a Christmas miracle.

Because most people have never had a problem with USPS. And to answer the rest of the question, we have politicians who are trying to trash USPS due to lobbying and ideological reasons.

As for problems with shipping carriers, I had an order shipped to me from Los Angeles in the past that took a month to get to me in Sacramento which is 390 miles north of Los Angeles by road. The package went from Los Angeles to Kentucky to Dallas to Arizona then back to Kentucky then vanished and was declared lost by UPS and another one was shipped to me that went to Kentucky, then Seattle and to Sacramento. That took 6 days. I found the first package in front of my door when I came home from work and checked the tracking number again to see where it went. It went back to Arizona again, back to Kentucky, then was scanned in Utah before coming to Sacramento. And, I ship a lot of packages where I work. We mostly use UPS. Sometimes FedEX. There have been numerous times where packages go off in the wrong direction with the last scan stating it departed from some location to never be seen again. So, it is just part of shipping things. I can see that happening on occasion. However, I think it has gotten worse over the years.

 

[Bill]

One thing that went from China to US that took a holy wow route (99% just goes plane to LAX, then semi to my door), was some thermal paste for electronics that went through Tanzania, full refund on that cause it took more than 90 days to get to me.

Anything I've ever ordered "from China" was only postmarked in the Los Angeles area and always had US postage and arrived here in 1-2 days, which is to be expected from anything shipped from Southern California. I think most of that stuff is in warehouses down there and the China thing is so they can avoid taxes.

 

[Brain75]

Well I am ordering a fair amount of stuff from Aliexpress (why buy it on amazon for $20 when you can get it on Ali for $3), and they give you shipping numbers like LP####### - 9 digit things that only track in china post... starts in guandong china, dies for 9 days in customs, flies to "port of entry" (always LAX) dies in us customs for 10-12 days, then goes to a private post-n-ship kinda place for a day and gets a USPS number, then semi truck to Denver, then so on and so on. Pretty sure it is actually going from China.


FWIW, never order anything on Ali anywhere even close to chinese new year (2nd full moon of the year, typically early feb - just don't do it, trust me, spend the money for amazon those 3 weeks).

 

[sgtsandman]

I don't want to comment since my mail hasn't been too bad lately. I don't understand why Amszon uses them for some deliveries. If Amazon was smart, they'd steer clear of USPS.

I think it was a deal Amazon, FEDEX, and UPS agreed to with USPS so that USPS would get at least some of the business instead of being totally circumvented and be made mostly irrelevant, if I remember correctly.

In a way, it's a good thing USPS is still around. Could you imagine what shipping charges would be if USPS wasn't around to keep them somewhat in check? People complain about shipping costs as it is already.

 

[19Walt93]

Decades ago one of my customers who worked at the White River Junction,Vt post office cancelled the stamp on his own electric bill when he mailed it to Lebanon, NH- right across the Connecticut river- and it took 10 days to get there.
One of my service advisors ahd a weekend job driving a tractor trailer from WRJ to Burlington, Vt hauling mail. When he backed up to the loading dock a clock started and the mail had to be unloaded in a set time. Several times his truck wasn't unloaded, they closed and locked the trailer and sent him back to WRJ. At the WRJ dock they'd see that the load was for Burlington and send him back there. That meant an extra approximately 200 miles of transportation expense.
Last winter the overhead door company in the next town repaired one of my doors. After 4-5 weeks I called to ask if they were going to bill me. I had used the same company for years to repair doors at the dealership and the owner is a friend so I didn't know. They mailed the statement from 3 miles away and it has never gotten here. I paid over the phone with my credit card.
It's easy to blame Lajoy but the problem preceded him by decades.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

I wish USPS had the same commitment for delivering packages as they do bills.

They never seem to miss a bill. Package shipping is horrible.