Goin' Postal... The Same Old Problems With Mail Delivery

I appreciate your interest in the postal situation. Unfortunately, the Post Office is giving us all a runaround and also being a little stingy with the truth.

To start, the station manager is inaccurate (I am being charitable here) when he says he's had no complaints. In fact, I have called TWICE since January, when our deliveries took another turn for the worse. So there were at least TWO complaints lodged. I got the same old tired story about the route being rearranged. I was told that they would put a watch on the mail, and that they would assign only one carrier to the route.

I don't really care when I get the mail; I don't get home from work before 6, and what mail I get is generally there.

My issue is this: The mail simply disappears for long periods. I subscribe to a weekly, The National Catholic Reporter. It arrives at least a week late. It arrives out of order. It arrives two weeks at a time. The reason, I am told, is anthrax. Only problem is, this has been happening since long before anthrax.

I subscribe to The New York Review of Books. So does my boss. His arrives at our downtown DC office four days before mine does at Duncan Place (anthrax again???).

I tend to get all my first class mail in one delivery. And, not only do I get mine, but I sometimes get my neighbors'. I even got some mail once for the principal of the Miner School (not even close to my address).

I have lived on Duncan Place since 1985. When I first moved here, we had an older gentleman who delivered our mail. He retired. Then the problems began.

I have been calling the Post Office since before I left my previous job (that was in 1992). Along the way I have had interesting explanations and empty promises. All seem to center around the fact that this is not a real or a full route or that no one wants our route. One particularly honest station manager told me once that the only people he could get to deliver the mail on this route were the new hires, and he said half of them can't read and the other half are on drugs. Explains a lot.

There was once a golden age, though — just a few years ago. There was an experimental program that provided certain areas with an ombudsman and we had a wonderful one. Her name was Linda Reed.

When I told her what was happening she did several things. She sent me postal envelopes for me to send back any mail that was delivered to me but not addressed to me. She monitored the route. She checked in on how things were going. Once I sent back the misdirected mail, it didn't take long for that problem to clear up, because she had the proof (I noted the day it was received so she could track down the delivery). Weeklies showed up on time. It was a great program, and I wrote a letter of commendation for Ms. Reed and the program to the postmaster. So what happened? They ended the program! And the mail went back to its same tired old problems.

So you see, I've heard Ms. Larson's story (or variations thereof) before, so you will have to excuse me if I don't get too excited by her and Mr. Payne (to whom I have complained as recently as two months ago). Perhaps they will find our mail buried alongside the weapons of mass destruction.

P.S. The key to Excello is N-A Minit. Get rid of that and you will have solved the problem. §