MailmanDave
17 Years Experience
Long Island, NY
Male, 43
I am a City Letter Carrier for the US Postal Service in NY. I've been a city letter carrier for over 17 years and it is the best job I've ever had. I mostly work 5 days per week (sometimes includes a Saturday) and often have the opportunity for overtime, which is usually voluntary. The route I deliver has about 350 homes and I walk to each of their doors to deliver the mail. Please keep in mind that I don't have authority to speak for the USPS, so all opinions are solely mine, not my employer.
I wouldn't recommend it unless you put a stamp on the envelope. The reason I say this is because the mailbox is only supposed to be used for US Mail with proper postage. That being said, if you leave the envelope in the mailbox clearly marked for the recipient company or resident with no postage it's possible the letter carrier would notice it and just leave it in the mailbox. That is what I would do but I can't speak for another letter carrier who isn't paying attention and just takes an envelope that looks like it could be outgoing mail. If you put the payment envelope in the mailbox with the address and postage it could be taken as outgoing mail but you can rest assured it will get to the recipient within a couple of days as a regular piece of mail. If possible, could you find an alternate place to put the payment or pay electronically?
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Thanks for the compliment PK. I've been delivering mail for more than 16 years now. I've had a lot of personal ups and downs, mostly off the job, but glad to have continued to work and have the job security of the USPS. If you mean delivering mail for 7 hours, I think that would be hard for most people. But if you mean 7 hours street time that is a bit different because then you'd factor in loading time,lunch and breaks and travel time to/from your route. The route I deliver is approximately 6:40 total but only 5:20 Apprx is actually delivering mail. It's not too exhausting except if the mail load is heavy. My hints are to try to be as organized as you can, don't engage in too much small talk with the customers, and get a good nights rest and have a healthy breakfast. That all works for me. Everybody is different plus the difficulty of the route may vary between cities. I deliver on a flat terrain besides walking up steps to the mailboxes. If you have to walk a lot of hills that could make you more tired. Good luck to you and what might be a 7-hour route could take you longer or shorter based on the above factors.
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I was looking at the USPS website about Priority Mail Express and it says that there is a guaranteed delivery date but it's not available in all areas to be exactly the next day. We used to deliver Express Mail on Sunday but that may be only available in certain places. If you sent the item out on Friday it was possibly past the deadline for Saturday delivery and the destination PO may not offer Sunday Priority Mail express delivery. In this case the item you mailed will be delivered Monday. There is a decent amount of information about Priority Mail Express on USPS.com. Be sure to read the disclaimers as it pertains to service being available 365 days per year.
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I am not sure why this happened and what will happen to your mail for the 3 days you mentioned. It should have been delivered until 10/8 as far as I know. After that, the forwarding should commence to your new address and will probably be a few more days before any forwarded mail arrives there. It's possible your "old" post office is holding the mail until 10/9 to forward it but I can't say for sure. I don't know if you have time to go to the PO to ask them why this happened and it's possible that by the time you find out it will almost be 10/9 and the mail will have been forwarded.
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I can't say for sure why the drastic difference in the time your mail is delivered. If it's the same letter carrier who is coming at different times I can see a couple of hours difference but your description is up to 5.5 hrs difference. Normally the mail is sorted before we start delivering. Any mail which we pick up during the day as outgoing mail doesn't need to be separated. We just bring it back and give it to a dispatch clerk. At times we are shorthanded at the USPS so that results in us doing additional assignments possibly before delivering our own routes. This could be up to a couple of hours but that doesn't seem to be the norm where I work. Please remember that I can't speak for what happens at other postal facilities. One further comment is that we are supposed to deliver the mail in a specific route order. If your letter carrier doesn't do that it could result in different delivery times. The holiday season for cards isn't as busy as it used to be. We now deliver a significant quantity of parcels which could also take up time.
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Are you referring to having a pen for a signature of accountable mail like a certified or registered item? I would say we are supposed to carry a pen because we sometimes have to leave a notice that we attempted a delivery but were not able to leave the item for whatever reason. With the current mail data collection device items can be signed for directly on an electronic screen with a stylus or fingernail. No pen is required unless the sender has requested a return receipt to be signed. Basically it is good practice to carry a pen at all times while delivering the mail.
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If you want to apply to be a letter carrier, the process begins at www.usps.com and look for an employment or careers tab. It has been many years since I applied so I don't know the process now. There is an exam, interview, and medical (including a drug test). I don't believe the process is that difficult based on the quality of employees that I've seen get hired lately. If you are hired as a City Carrier Assistant (CCA), you can expect to start out just filling in where needed when routes are overburdened with mail or carriers are out for some reason (injury, vacation, jury duty, military service). It means being very flexible with your schedule and sometimes working as much as 7 days/week. We have regular mail delivery Mon-Sat and then some offices deliver Amazon.com parcels on Sunday. You can apply anytime for the position so I wouldn't necessarily drop college right away. Earning a degree can make you more marketable in other feels. Working as a letter carrier doesn't require any higher education as far as I know. When you start out the pay is approximately $16/hr and there are virtually zero benefits except a small amount of paid time off. There is hardly any guarantee of hours to work and it could take awhile before you become a full-time regular employee which can be worthwhile. I do really like the job, but I did get a bachelors degree many years earlier. I didn't know what career I wanted to have and ultimately wound up at the USPS when I was 27 years old with a lot of encouragement from my father and friends. Working safely and accurately are two important attributes to the job. Good luck to you and please post any more questions you may have!
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