Model Railroading > The problem with the USPS

Is it any wonder why the USPS is loosing money. Their system is so broken one has to wonder if it can ever be fixed or just scrapped and turned over to a private concern. I ordered a couple freight cars from a hobby shop 116 miles to the south of me. Now I could have driven down there and back in just a few hours, but with Diesel at 5 bucks a gallon here in Nor Cal i figured Ill just have it sent USPS instead of a hundred bucks in fuel. Now due to the efficiency of the USPS if you send a letter in Redding to Anderson, a distance of 10 miles, the letter travels all the way to Sacramento and back, 150 miles each way. This package left Yuba City, went to Sacramento, then to Los Angeles, then to San Francisco where it is stalled It will be a week or more before it arrives. I ordered from the Train Shop in Santa Clara and it went out UPS in the afternoon and arrived her the following morning at 10am. Go figure.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/21 12:34 by TomG.

IIRC DeJoy was appointed to the PO specifically to transform mail service to private enterprise.
Like Gardner at Amtrak it appears the first steps are to drive off the little customers and small towns so they can play in the big cities with big boys like Amazon and New York City.
Locally, we seem to have good service in southwest Washington though and the PO staff is always helpful but they are stressed about not being permitted to work overtime.

  Try and beat this. Atl to Mia to Toronto then the upper west coast. A total of 12 days for 2 day Priority. They will gladly take your money and try to up grade you..  Most of them don;t give a crap...

    Steve H.

   



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/21 12:52 by hartrick24.

I think the only reason that give you tracking is so you can enjoy watching it pinball back and forth before they return it to sender and say undeliverable.

I always know if a packaging is coming out of California headed to Texas that it will take forever to get out of California.  
I can have stuff sent from anywhere else in the US and it takes 5 business days at the most.  CA is closer to double that.

Jim

Yep, we've all had experiences like that.

On the flip side, a couple of years ago I mis-addressed a package to my nephew in Houston.  My bad -- transposed two numbers and came up with a non-existent address.  USPS went to the trouble of running down the correct address, based on his name, and delivered it within a few days in the midst of the Christmas rush.

More recently:  Our delivery guy in semi-rural North Idaho carries big plastic bags.  If we have a package too big for our "loaf of bread" mail box on the County road, he takes it up our pretty sketchy private road, wraps it in plastic, and does his best to put it out of the weather behind our screen door.

Lost a sizable inbound business check almost two months ago in USPS, just had it re-issued.

This time, FEDEX.    Well, they've never scanned it on pickup, overnight service drop box, no record.  Now been a week.

Pigeons? 

sf1010 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yep, we've all had experiences like that.
>
> On the flip side, a couple of years ago I
> mis-addressed a package to my nephew in Houston. 
> My bad -- transposed two numbers and came up with
> a non-existent address.  USPS went to the trouble
> of running down the correct address, based on his
> name, and delivered it within a few days in the
> midst of the Christmas rush.
>
> More recently:  Our delivery guy in semi-rural
> North Idaho carries big plastic bags.  If we have
> a package too big for our "loaf of bread" mail box
> on the County road, he takes it up our pretty
> sketchy private road, wraps it in plastic, and
> does his best to put it out of the weather behind
> our screen door.

Having postal delivery must be nice. We don't have postal delivery and have to drive 16 miles to the post office and get the privilege of paying 200 dollars a year for a tiny Po box. Just 5 years ago it cost nothing. I bet it wont be long till they start charging everyone 200 dollars a year so they will access your personal mail box.

I live in the Bay area, and have ordered scores of items from all over the country.  My experience with USPS as been quite excellent, unlike UPS (frequently crushed, slashed, or damaged)  or Fedex (damaged and/or simply lost).  Additionally, I have shipped a ton of items all over the country without a major problem--even during bad weather, south and east.  I hope my good fortune holds. 

What do you all think of the FedEx person that dumped all those packages at various locations down South? I suppose he/she couldn't get it done by the end of the day, so dumped them to avoid losing his or her job? No excuse but pretty bizarre.

I saw a photo of some of the boxes that had been retrieved and they appeared to be open.... It's a wonder the police didn't want any volunteers to help...

Victor



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/21 15:44 by wabash2800.

I have been buying and selling model railroad items since 1997. I always ship by USPS and have rarely had any problems. Most recently an item was shipped to me here in Lacey (Olympia) Washington on Thursday and I received it on Saturday. Most of the delivery problems that I have experience have been caused by the shipper, not the carrier.
Bill Pyper
Lacey, WA
 

It's under the Fedral Goverment where efficiency is not in there vocabulary. Expect nothing !

Steve

Mine was not a shipper issue. They called me at 8am in moring to verify everything and shipped it at 10 am that morning. All the info from USPS is correct on the tracking. I have to say in the past it was pretty goot, but the last few years it just keeps getting worse. Hello, 200 bucks for a po box with no other way to get your mail.

My medium size PO box in Mojave is about $50 a year...
UPS used to have PO do "last mile" home or business delivery but gave upn because of lousy service.

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

wabash2800 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> What do you all think of the FedEx person that
> dumped all those packages at various locations
> down South? I suppose he/she couldn't get it done
> by the end of the day, so dumped them to avoid
> losing his or her job? No excuse but pretty
> bizarre.
>
> I saw a photo of some of the boxes that had been
> retrieved and they appeared to be open.... It's a
> wonder the police didn't want any volunteers to
> help...

There have been cases of USPS employees losing, abandoning, or even hoarding undelivered mail, too.

The right's infatuation with making the postal service "more like a business," though, makes it less of a public service, which is what it's supposed to be.
 

I have sent and received well over 1,000 packages via USPS during the last five years.  Their  performance has generally been very good; certainly no worse than either UPS or FedEx.

It's fun to bash the USPS, and occasionally I watch a tracked package go off on a magical mystery tour, but truth told- these are exceptions to the rule.  I think they do a pretty good job.
We don't have home delivery up here in Dutch Flat, it's all PO Boxes (Free).  The lady that puts up the mail is always friendly and helpful.  She'll even stop by the house and feed my cat if I'm away a few days! (Gotta love small towns)
SR

The excellent service and on time deliveries I receive from USPS compared the very poor service and on time delivery from UPS or FedX makes me wonder how does UPS and FedX stay in business.

Problem with the post office is mail is sorted only at one place for a several county area.  Even if mail is addressed to a town just 5 miles away it will be sent to the sorting center anywhere from 25 to 75 miles on its first handling.  For example mail originating in Ft Worth no matter if it is to an address in Ft Worth, it will first go to a sorting center in Dallas some 32 miles away.

Some efficiency, eh?

5spot Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's under the Fedral Goverment where efficiency
> is not in there vocabulary. Expect nothing !
>
> Steve

It’s under the feds AND it’s unionized….the best of both worlds when it comes to inefficiency!

Sean

Posted from iPhone