I love our United States “Postal” Service.
Back on the 10th of this month, Kary over at Endeavor Stitch Works put my belt in the mail, with Priority service and delivery confirmation. As a reminder, Priority Mail packages “reach their destination in 2-3 days”, according to the USPS webpage and offices.
Well, today is the 16th – three full business days since the 10th, and five full calendar days, and I still do not have my package. Worse, the tracking number that was associated with my package had not been updated since the 10th… until last night, ’round about 2000, when I found that it had been “processed through sort facility”… at the city Kary mailed it from. The package had been, quite literally, sitting on its figurative ass for five full calendar days, until some dimwitted, unionized, unmotivated, uncaring “Postal” Service employee realized that he should probably do something about that.
Wonderful.
In this particular case, it kind of falls under the “who cares?” category, but when examined as part of a whole this situation serves as not-so-mute testimony as to the mismanagement, ineffectiveness, waste, and inefficiency currently plaguing the USPS. There are no two ways around it – the USPS is a federally-enforced monopoly, and one that probably would not survive competition on the open market… and yet here we are, legally bound to use a company for “first class” mail when they cannot even sort out how to get “priority” mail from point A to point B in twice the time allotted.
In short, the USPS is your federal government, hard at work. Worried yet?
That sounds just like nearly every experience I have with them. I’m sure regular letters in the mail suffer the same way, just no tracking numbers to see it.
Well, I can match those horror stories with UPS and FedEx. I can also tell a story about ordering an item at about 7:30 Wednesday night with regular US mail delivery (no special handling) and having it arrive in my mail box Friday morning.
UPS and FedEx have about a 50% error rate in delivery and we have to rely on the neighbors to deliver it to us (or us to them). USPS gets it in my mail box 100% of the time.
It may be a boondoggle, but at least it’s Constitutionally authorized: Art 1, Sec VIII.
Same statement, second half, could be used to justify the Interstate System, IMHO
(“The Congress shall have Power … To Establish Post Offices and Post Roads” if you don’t have a copy handy)
I’ve had better luck with the USPS than I’ve ever had with FedEx or UPS. UPS usually does a pretty good job of getting my stuff to me in a timely fashion, but IMHO they overcharge for that service. FedEx either gets lost or is a week late every damn time. USPS? 2-3 day, never more than a week.
First, RobertM, FedEx/UPS doesn’t over charge for their service. If you notice the post office has been losing craps loads of money (like in the billions) each year because they don’t charge enough for their service. I don’t know why people have bad luck with FedEx, normally their service is fantastic. In fact, the last package I got from them was a day early and it came from Washington State.
As for the USPS, today they pissed me off again. Yesterday I mailed a package back to someone who had mailed it to me express mail. Going back it was Priority Mail and I had printed off a label that was for PM. I had removed most of the five million express mail stickers that the USPS sticks on package, but missed one and a half. Today in my mailbox was the package back with a notice that I couldn’t ship it Priority Mail with express mail stickers…even though I had a fully paid PM mailing label on it. So yes, the USPS workers are SO DUMB that they can’t scan a package to see that it’s going PM and not express mail. What must FedEx/UPS do with all those air packages that could be either overnight or 3 day select? THEY SCAN THEM LIKE PEOPLE WITH EVEN A SMALL AMOUNT OF BRAINS!
I’ve had good luck w/ my local USPS office. They go out of their way to help. Other offices vary w/ mileage. Fedex and UPS I’ve also had mixed results w/. Had one of them almost steal a rifle that was being shipped. It ‘disappeared’ and they told me to fill out a claim form. Until I threatened to call the ATF. They ‘found’ it about 5 min. later. Literally.
Miminum prices for non-government carriers (like UPS and Fedex) are mandated by law. This is so that the USPS is always the low price leader. If you think that UPS and Fedex overcharge, lobby your congressman to get rid of the monopolistic pricing scheme.
MatthewR: It has nothing to do with the intelligence of the workers, it’s the intelligence of the management – the workers are literally PROHIBITED from sending it on, or even covering/removing the express mail stickers (I’ve actually heard this directly from a postal worker – “you have to do it, I’m not allowed to”). They can actually get in trouble for doing what is obviously right. Stupid, I know, but those are the rules they have to follow.
Ian: I can’t speak for Linoge, but I always have a copy handy. It was one of the first things I put on my phone when I switched to Android. I had a version on my Palm Pre, too.
I’m not sure if Japan Post makes money or lives off subsidies like the USPS does, but the way they deal with delivery and collection has got to cost less than ours.
If you want to mail something, you either take it to the post office, or put it in a mailbox in your neighborhood (not in the box outside your house). If you get mail, they deliver it to your house.
It cuts out the daily visit to every house we currently have in favor of pickups at fewer locations.
On the other hand, given the sheer volume of junk mail I get, I imagine the mailman would show up every day regardless.
@ JP: Coincidentally, the USPS does not release statistics on the number of packages or letters lost… or even how long their average deliveries take. Surprised?
@ tom: The speedy delivery of your package was probably facilitated by the closeness of the distribution center sending it, and the accuracy of your local box-filler may or may not be indicative of the efficacy of the organization as a whole. That said, they all have shortcomings, I just wish we had a choice.
@ Ian Argent: I do indeed have more than a few copies handy, and I have no problems with the existance of a federal mailcarrying service; I have a problem with their federally-mandated monopoly on first class mail.
@ RobertM: Reputo nailed the price problem, and speaking anecdotally, I have never had things more than a day or two late from UPS, and typically a day or two early from FedEx. Now, in college, do not even get me started on any of them…
@ Matthew R: In that case, as Jake said, it was a combination of policy and people, but in both cases, I agree – it is retarded. So damned many things about the USPS are retarded, but that is entirely because it does not have to worry about its continued existance – it forcibly has the market cornered, and no one can legally do anything about it.
@ Thirdpower: Heh, convenient, that. FedEx charged me an arm and a leg to ship my open top to its eventual buyer, but when the package showed up four hours late, since it was a “priority express super-duper awesome” shipment, they refunded the entire cost. I could live with that
.
@ Reputo: Bingo! And that is what happens when the federal government starts imposing monopolies on the open market…
@ Jake: Heh, I have that exact one on my phone, and about ten of the freebie ones from the Heritage Foundation sitting about ten feet from me.
@ wfgodbold: Hell, I would be immensely happy if the Postal Service simply did not deliver mail unless there was an actual first-class-postage item in the stack – i.e. bulk mailings would have to wait at the office. I guarandamntee you they would save a fortune on gas alone.
I honestly wish they’d just give up the pretense of an “independant” Post Office and go back to running it as a government service (which is what it is). They’re never going to give up subsidizing service to the rural areas, because of the Senate. Stop pretending.
@ Matthew R:
FedEx doesn’t overcharge???!?!?! – oh yes they do!
When I receive a parcel in Oz from the US, if the value is below a certain limit, Australian Customs doesn’t bother to charge import duty or other taxes that are (technically) due.
But FedEx does – they tack on the charges that they THINK Australian Customs COULD have imposed, add a “collection fee”, refuse to deliver the package because “charges are owed” and DEMAND that I pay that amount in person at the FedEx depot when I pick up the parcel. No payment, no parcel.
Often it more than doubles the initial cost of freight – which is higher than the alternatives already.
No such issues with other freight companies or USPS.
I am not a big fan of USPS but I think its carelessness can be explained by the fact that it is a national postal service. That means its main goal is not to make as much profit as possible but to create a channel of communication across the country. When there are small profits, there is not much motivation.
Might not be any profit in it – hence my comment about stop pretending.
@ Ian Argent: *dingdingdingding* I have no problems if the government wants to impose legislation dictating that the self-same government has to use the post office (after all, it is yet another governmental agency… and one the military honestly avoided using as much as possible), but giving us, the taxpayers, no choice? Bugger to that.
@ Sendarius: Unfortunately, I cannot speak to anything outside of the States, but the prices FedEx charges here are roughly competitive with UPS. USPS is, for reasons previously mentioned, not a fair comparison.
@ Lorne Marr: I think it is more of a “we do not care because you do not have a choice” problem, personally – if there is no competition, there is no need ot provide a reasonable service for a reasonable price.