Inefficient USPS Fails Again--#USPSFail--a Review
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| Mail that was supposed to arrive by Au. 3 didn't arrive until Aug. 21 |
The USPS continues in its history of inefficient mail delivery. I have had many bad experiences over the year with lost mail, damaged packages and overnight deliveries that take several days to arrive. This incident is the latest in a string of countless failures of the USPS to do its job.
United States Postal Service Priority Mail Fail
In July my friend C Norman sent me a time-sensitive package from Texas to Tennessee mailed Priority Mail. She sent it on July 31. The expected delivery was Aug. 3. When did it arrive? On Aug. 21.
“That’s not the end of the world,” one might say. No, but my friend paid extra for Priority because the timing of the gift’s arrival was important. If she wanted it to arrive the end of August, she could have paid less for standard postage.
If this incident doesn’t make you want to boo the post office, let me share that I was supposed to get married last September in Oklahoma. The date was set, the minister was booked, the chapel was booked and I drove to Oklahoma a few days before... without my drivers license! It had fallen out of my purse while I was packing.
USPS Overnight Fail
My friend Pam picked it up for me and paid over $20 for overnight delivery so I would get it just in time for the wedding. But the post office failed again. My drivers license did not show up until a few days later. I had to cancel the preacher, cancel the chapel and cancel the wedding the day of the wedding. I ended up having the first panic attack of my life with blood pressure and pulse spiking so high I had to spend what would have been my wedding day paying for a trip to the ER. Thank you, USPS.
USPS Forwarding Fail
Because I was going to spend my honeymoon and an extra month or so in Oklahoma getting to know my new family, I opted to have my mail forwarded to my husband’s address. It was supposed to take a few business days to begin forwarding. Guess when my first mail arrived? Well over a month later. Both times calls to the USPS to speed things up and locate missing mail were futile. No one ever seems to have a clue what’s going on at the United States Postal Service, where the work "Service" is simply irony.
USPS Delivery Fail
This is par for the course. Many years ago, in October I became aware I was missing bills and other mail. I began to call the post office and stop by, inquiring about my missing mail. No one had any idea. By November I had missed quite a bit of mail but was still getting regular mail deliveries, so the Mystery of the Missing Mail depended.
I talked to Myrna, the manager at my local PO several times. We had become friendly over the years as had most of the window clerks. I asked the guys at the window. I talked to Robert, the guy who handled mail holds. I asked my postman. No one had any idea.
By December I wasn’t just missing mail; I was missing birthday and Christmas packages. No one could find them. Towards the end of January, someone found three large plastic baskets overflowing with my mail. Gifts hadn’t been received, bills hadn’t been paid, Christmas and birthday cards that hadn’t been delivered had been squirreled away, and no one knew anything about it. Three months of random mail lost in my local PO and no one could find it.
The same thing happened to me the following year for a shorter period. One day I heard an employee at my local Walgreens telling a customer about his almost identical experience.
J. Peter Grace on USPS Inefficiency
No wonder business leader J. Peter Grace called out the USPS for its incredible wastefulness back in the 1980s when President Reagan asked him to lead The Grace Commission on waste and inefficiency in the Federal Government. This poor management has been going on for decades. This was part of his recommendation on page 76 of 153 of the Hearing Before the Committee of Finance United States Senate 98th Congress on February 8, 1984.
Related Articles:
US Postal Service Drops the Ball Twice in October: USPS Review
Darden has been a writer for both Yahoo and Examiner as well as a contributor to many magazines, newspapers and websites. Connect with Darden.
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