Usually don't rely on outgoing mail from home mailboxes. Was helping someone move into a new house yesterday. Their postal card establishing their authorized mail delivery was in the box, flag up. The postal employee drove up, ignored the flag, put in a letter without taking out the contents of the mailbox.

Not a big deal but I think the last 5x I've tried using the old flag system it was ignored.

One might say that this indicator of future job performance would be a ...

red flag.

Bingo!

Nope. It may indicate to give zero fucks and to shove what is in there further back in the mailbox.

Never use the flag up for any important mail... But have used it for return to sender / no such person / moved 18 years ago/etc... I assume it is taken by my local postal carrier person because it has dissapeared after they pass thru........Now.. I trust my local postal delivery person
but I live just inside the main entrance of a approx 700 home subdivison with so much traffic every day... It just might be some of my neighbors that I do not trust.. A lock only slows a honest person down......................... drill sgt.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: drill sgt,

My mail carrier is actually pretty good . No complaints for now .

My guys are not great but they haven't degenerated into not knowing what the flag means. Yet.

I can’t trust that my mail won’t be stolen. The little flag just says take me. Around here there have been several post man robbed of their keys and the thieves now clean out the big curb side drop boxes also. All of my outgoing mail gets dropped in the slot inside the post office.

quote:

Originally posted by ChuckFinley:
Usually don't rely on outgoing mail from home mailboxes. Was helping someone move into a new house yesterday. Their postal card establishing their authorized mail delivery was in the box, flag up. The postal employee drove up, ignored the flag, put in a letter without taking out the contents of the mailbox.

Not a big deal but I think the last 5x I've tried using the old flag system it was ignored.

That's a strange situation. If they're new to the house and the sole occupants, that means whatever mail the guy was delivering may have been for the previous occupants. Was the mail correctly addressed to the new occupants or no?

I had a situation about a year ago where a house was sold and I'd put a green card into the box for the new owner. They didn't fill it out for a few weeks but started getting stuff addressed to their home. Since the post office requires the green card be filled out prior to mail being delivered, I had to withhold the mail. They tried taping a note to the box and putting the flag up but were still not filling out the card. So I kept flipping the flag down until I got fed up and went to the house to explain what they're supposed to do.

My pet peeve is people who put the flag up and expect us to put it down as a signal that we've been by and left mail in the box. I just leave the flag up for them.

I don’t trust it. I just drop stuff in the box at the PO and hope for the best. Also - some cards have arrived partially opened enough times to show someone was clearly checking for cash.

quote:

I had a situation about a year ago where a house was sold and I'd put a green card into the box for the new owner. They didn't fill it out for a few weeks but started getting stuff addressed to their home. Since the post office requires the green card be filled out prior to mail being delivered, I had to withhold the mail. They tried taping a note to the box and putting the flag up but were still not filling out the card. So I kept flipping the flag down until I got fed up and went to the house to explain what they're supposed to do.

I wish I could tell you the number of times I'd put those cards in a vacant houses box, just for landlords to take them out....then complain that mail was being left at the vacant house.
Me: Why'd you take the card out?
LL: "I don't want people to know it's vacant"
Me: Mkay.
Haven't used them in years.

quote:

Originally posted by pedropcola:
My guys are not great but they haven't degenerated into not knowing what the flag means. Yet.

This. Exactly.

I've bitched about our mail service before, so won't repeat it here. But, at least as yet, they still take outgoing mail when we put up the little flag.

In answer to above, the mail that was delivered was not for them.

Will have the answer Friday as to if the card has been picked up or anything else delivered.

From there, going to advise that they turn in the green card at the local post office and also either put a hold on the mail or have a neighbor pick up the mail until they move in Memorial day weekend.

Off-hand, it could be that...

A) The carrier is a new employee, is forgetting his (albeit minimal) training, and not taking the "outgoing" mail your friends put in the box.
B) The previous occupants possibly didn't submit a mail forward or the regular carrier didn't update his records for the forward, so the new employee wouldn't have known to withhold the mail addressed to the previous occupants.

Once in the first few months I'd started working at the post office, I accidentally skipped a mailbox that had outgoing mail but that was because the residents were in their driveway and I stopped short of the box to hand them their mail and packages directly. Then, not thinking, I just drove on to the next house. The person I'd just handed mail to had to chase me down at the next box to hand me her mail.