Are you getting those magazines a week late? All your ‘do not bend’ letters folded in half? Swapping mail with the people across the street every day? Are you even getting any mail at all?
Photo by Gareth J.M. Saunders
Park Slope is starting to feel like that Seinfeld episode where Jerry completes Newman’s mail route with gusto, and is later scolded by Newman after he gets flack from his fellow carriers: “Too many people got their mail! Close to 80%… Nobody from the post office has ever cracked the 50% barrier! It’s like the 3-minute mile!”
Mail service in the 11215 zip code has been varying wildly of late. Reports on the Park Slope Message Board range from a few stating they’ve gotten of excellent service, to posters like Christina who have spent too much time peering into an empty box. After several phone calls and complaints, Christina finally got an answer: “I got a phone call back (from the mailman’s supervisor)…his reason for not having delivered my mail recently is that “IT SLIPPED HIS MIND”.
What else? jenntrixie and sweetpea both report mail being dumped into an unsorted pile in the hall. And with the holiday season coming up, mail service will likely slow down for all of us.
How does your mail carrier rate? Report it on the Park Slope Message Board
Where shall I start? The time the post office delivered the pink slip which indicated a package was waiting two weeks after the package hit the post office, and one day after the package (containing medication) was returned to sender? And the person at the window yelled at me for waiting so long to come in with the slip. Or the time they delivered my package to the building next door (rental building w/almost the same address), and I knew it had been delivered somewhere because I could track it online – only to find the empty box with the packing slip outside in their courtyard.
I reported it to the postal police and they never called back. Or the time I waited 45 minutes at the post office to pick up a package during which time they managed to extricate only 3 packages from the pile inside, and I still had 7 people ahead of me. Or the time I received the mail for seven different addresses on my block. I now have all of my bills delivered online and packages delivered to my work address. Anything important at all I just do not trust them to deliver (or my neighbors to deliver). I can, however, rely on the 11215 Van Brunt employees to walk out in a group for breakfast at 8:00 and to return and eat said breakfast before helping anyone. This is not a joke – there are a few good helpful people there, but the service is outrageously bad, and often rude.
11215 – Van Brunt station is totally out of line. I’ve made numerous complaints directly to them (when I’ve gotten through) and to the USPS 800 hot line. I think if hundreds of disgruntled customers complained to the USPS we MIGHT get somewhere – who knows.
It’s a very, very bad situation. They don’t have enough staff to sort the mail and definitely don’t have enough carriers.
It’s not the carrier’s fault most of the time, its a hellacious job. The supervisors at Van Brunt are ridiculous. You are right that there are not enough carriers and what most people don’t realize is that the carriers are timed! They have to scan every few blocks or so into a GPS and they have to be back to the station by a certain time. All this and the sorting before they ever hit the streets. I know because my close family member sweated it out there for a year. Also, he complained that if mail had an apt number on it, he would put it in the corresponding box. If the party no longer lived there, the occupants would throw it on the floor or table and then other occupants would call the Post Office to complain about the carrier! Park Slope gets 8 times as much mail per head as Bay Ridge Post office. FYI, take it easy on the carriers. Also, the people who work at the counter are a different division than the carriers.