USPS Tracking...

s&wchad

s&wchad

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We received an insured package containing a hardcover book about dealing with a rare disease on October 4th. The label listed our street address, city and zip code correctly, but it was addressed to someone we've never heard of and has never lived here. Neither of us have that disease.

It was shipped from a company in Pennsylvania. I gave the package to our mailman a couple days later and the PO has been updating the return status on Informed Delivery ever since. It's still in transit and left San Bernardino yesterday.

Michigan to Pennsylvania, via California??? I probably should have just thrown it in the trash... The tracking history makes an interesting read! :rolleyes:

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I have had two USPS packages recently cross the country, show up in my city, re-cross the country and then show back up here to be delivered a week later - a week behind schedule.

I've been a big defender of USPS (here, I believe), but I'd say they're affected by the same deterioration of efficiency and order that we're seeing in so many aspects of life these days.
 
USPS does an amazing job handling millions of pieces of mail every day. But when they screw up, they do so royally. :eek:
Not long ago I had a package take 32 days to get from one end of my state to the other. It bounced around through 7 different cities multiple times each until one day it just mysteriously appeared in my mailbox. For 3 months after that tracking showed it "In transit to next facility from Atlanta." :rolleyes:

USPS Tracking:
1. We have it
2. Ain't got a clue
3. Delivered!
:mad:
 
USPS Tracking #2...

Another package:

I ordered an item off eBay on Oct. 12th and it arrived on Oct. 15th. Unfortunately, the seller shipped the wrong item. I contacted him and he told me to keep the 1st item and he'd send the correct item ASAP. It was scheduled to arrive on the 18th.

Here's the tracking info so far... So much for 2-3 day delivery! :rolleyes:

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I wouldn't be surprised if the next stop is Abu Dhabi!
 

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johngalt said:
I remember a year or 2 ago reading about the post office removing or replacing some of their sorting equipment. Maybe things aren't working as smoothly as they could?
Click to expand...

I could go into a long discussion of our current Postmaster General. But the last time I did that I got my hand slapped. :rolleyes:
 
FWIW, all it takes is for the item to get sorted into the wrong mailbag and it will make a cross-country trip via plane or train.
Logistics is a LOT harder than it sounds when you're dealing with millions of items per day.
Just my 2 cents - and worth every penny it cost ya' ;)
 
To repeat myself:


"The U.S. Postal Service handles around 500 million pieces of mail every day. UPS and FedEx deliver 34 million packages combined. Those are astounding numbers and their failure rates barely budge the needle.

Gas up your car and try retrieving/delivering your own mail/parcels for the same rates as those three charge and see how that works out.

They do Herculean tasks everyday. If my stuff is late once in a while I cut them slack because they cast huge nets and there are bound to be a few holes here and there."
__________________
 
rockquarry said:
With some exceptions, tracking has become the toy of the impatient, wanted-it-yesterday faction. Tracking won't make your package arrive sooner. Relax. The Post Office does a pretty good job but like every other private or government entity, it isn't perfect.
Click to expand...

So...
I pay extra for 2-3 day delivery and it hadn't arrived 5 days later. I guess I should be happy.... :rolleyes:

Their terms aren't worth squat...
 
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Mailed a letter to the Social Security office in my very own zip code. The time and number of states through which it passed to be delivered to the same zip code was astounding.
 
I've observed similar with USPS lately ...
Midway order to Omaha ... probably a 3 hour drive one way so most orders hit my porch the following day if I order early enough.
USPS lately has been a model of inefficiency, sending things to PA and touring the East coast before going dark and magically appearing in Omaha some 2 weeks later.
 
rockquarry said:
With some exceptions, tracking has become the toy of the impatient, wanted-it-yesterday faction. Tracking won't make your package arrive sooner. Relax. The Post Office does a pretty good job but like every other private or government entity, it isn't perfect.
Click to expand...

nah .... something has changed ... not sure what, or why. but it did
 
Well I can go the po in my town and send a letter or card to someone and it has to go south 4 1/2 hours to Casper Wy and gets delivered maybe 2 days later or maybe not...even if it is going to someone with a mailbox in this town...Talk about Tupid
 
Skeet 028 said:
Well I can go the po in my town and send a letter or card to someone and it has to go south 4 1/2 hours to Casper Wy and gets delivered maybe 2 days later or maybe not...even if it is going to someone with a mailbox in this town...Talk about Tupid
Click to expand...

That is because they don't have a sorting and routing operation in every little podunk post office.

Everything that is picked up or dropped off each day has to be bagged up and sent to the nearest facility with the sorting and routing equipment and personnel to be sorted and routed through the network to its destination.

Do you expect your local carriers and postmaster to read and hand-sort each and every one of the hundreds or thousands of letters and packages they get every day, retain the ones that will be delivered locally, and only send the items that need to be delivered somewhere outside the local area to the sorting facility?

How many man-hours, either OT for the existing employees, or additional people hired, do you think it would take to do that?

Now multiply that by the thousands of other podunk town post offices that exist in a country the size of the USA.

Like I said in my previous post, the logistics of sorting, routing, and delivering MILLIONS of items per day, 6 days a week, is a LOT bigger and more complex job than most people realize.
 
BC38 said:
Logistics is a LOT harder than it sounds when you're dealing with millions of items per day.
Click to expand...

Really, cause UPS and FEDEX seem to do MULTIPLE USPS volumes, and they get it to me without going past me and back 6 times over 3 weeks.
 
In today's news:
Some 200,000 mail carriers have reached a tentative contract deal with the U.S. Postal Service that includes backdated pay raises and a promise to provide workers with air-conditioned trucks. The new agreement, which still needs to be ratified by union members, runs through November 2026.
Letter carriers have been working without a new contract, and being paid under the old contract, since their old one expired in May 2023.
 
CalifEd said:
In today's news:
Some 200,000 mail carriers have reached a tentative contract deal with the U.S. Postal Service that includes backdated pay raises and a promise to provide workers with air-conditioned trucks. The new agreement, which still needs to be ratified by union members, runs through November 2026.
Letter carriers have been working without a new contract, and being paid under the old contract, since their old one expired in May 2023.
Click to expand...

The price of a stamp will be a dollar before you know it
 
I hoped package #2 would be delivered to me today so I could install it on my truck. Keep in mind I ordered it on the 12th, with 2-3 day delivery.

WRONG...

Here's the latest tracking info...

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See my previous post about this...
https://smith-wessonforum.com/142094035-post4.html

My package sat in Pontiac for several days (10 minutes from my home) and is now on the way to Detroit (30+ minutes away). Dollars to doughnuts it will go back to Pontiac, before being delivered to my local PO and then to me.

I contacted the PO online and tried to file an investigation, but they didn't recognize my address.
1-800-GOPOUNDSAND (1-800-275-8777).

I was finally connected to a representative. Wait time was 35+ minutes, so I had them call me back.

I just got off the phone with them. They initiated an investigation and I should hear back in 3-5 days...

Whatever... :rolleyes:
 

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We've been having an ongoing issue here on the west side of Houston. Most of our mail goes through a processing facility in Missouri City, TX which is southwest of Houston. They were so backed up and mail was so late people started complaining to the Representatives in Congress. I've had packages sit there for a week, or longer. Many complaints about much longer delays. Congressmen started asking questions and writing letters.

Turns out they moved some sorting equipment from the Northside processing center, but nobody checked to see if the building in Missouri City was wired for power for said equipment. Of course it wasn't. Now the Northside has less equipment, and the equipment at the Missouri City facility just sat. Thousands of people complaining about missing mail. I haven't seen anything on TV about it lately, maybe they got it figured out.

But if you buy a lot of lead items, you need their flat rate service or you're gonna pay.
 
I ship quite frequently (10-12 parcels a week) but Not by usps any longer. Just too many losses and many weeks of delay. Priority makes zero difference and may even be worse.
When I buy anything, if there is not an option for ups (or Amazon) I skip the purchase. Letters seem to be all usps can handle lately.,especially if there is a holiday involved.
 
I live in Montana, our mail is always about 2 days behind when they say it will be delivered.
 
I never send anything priority mail as it seems like regular mail gets there on the same day. Why waste money AND let anyone know something important is in there.
 
luvsmiths said:
Really, cause UPS and FEDEX seem to do MULTIPLE USPS volumes, and they get it to me without going past me and back 6 times over 3 weeks.
Click to expand...
True. They do multiples of USPS volume in PACKAGES.
However, the USPS is also trying to handle 10x as many items in total - most of which is mail, not packages. The mail and packages both get handled by the same people, in the same facilities, using the same trucks, planes, and trains to move it all.
I'm not defending the USPS - I strongly prefer and recommend UPS for packages. But that doesn't change the reality that when you count mail, the USPS moves WAY more individual items than UPS and FedEx combined.
That was the point of my post. The logistics of moving the sheer number of items (packages and mail) is a pretty daunting task and much more complex than most people realize. So, a simple mistake - like an item getting accidentally sorted into the wrong mailbag - will send the item clear across the country on a train or plane.
It happens ALL the time.
 
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If the little Podunk as you call i00 letters in the office that would be a lot. Get a letter addressed to town put a cancel stamp on it and put in the mail box...Sending to a sorting place is ridiculous in podunk ***...Talking with the postmistress(of pain) she asked me why I wasn't shipping anything any more. I told her I was...but with UPS and FedEx...I used to send as many packages in a month as all the rest of the packages the podunk PO sent by everyone in a year. She knows why too. I had one package that I lost 800 dollars on and couldn't collect insurance...or actually they wouldn't pay. I actually got a 32 pound packge after more than a month of traveling around that weighed 17...so they said I got the package so no insurance. PO does great..I've never lost a package with UPS...or even Fed Ex
 
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