USPS Woes

At the start of the school year, the bus stop for my neighborhood was moved from the bottom of our neighborhood on an incredibly busy parkway to the top, where the street connects to another neighborhood street. A few parents grumbled because it meant a longer walk, but I was grateful for the change. Car accidents at the other location were frequent enough that they sometimes happened while students were waiting at the bus stop and it seemed like only a matter of time before children there were injured.
The only grumble I had with the location change was that it meant I knew I wouldn't be passing by my mailbox on a daily basis anymore, which would mean finding time to go get the mail; not an easy feat considering the weather and the difficulties involved in taking all my work children with me.
Nine months later I am still struggling with the "getting the mail" issue.
When our mailman can't fit any more mail into our box, he empties the whole thing and returns it to our sorting facility, about 6 miles up the road in a commercial area.
Getting to the mailbox down the street on a daily basis with multiple children? Complicated.
Going to the Post Office with multiple children? Not cool at all.
I'm a pro at taking the children shopping, to the farm, and on walks when the weather is cooperative but standing in line to talk to a USPS employee and then waiting while they retrieve my mail borders on torture.
Last week the mail got sent back for the 3rd time in 9 months. I called the USPS main line and requested that my mail be delivered to my home and was promised it would be there within 48 hours. After no mail (including in my mailbox, in spite of being told delivery would resume immediately) for another 4 days, I called again. I gave the polite and well spoken employee the case number from the previous week and she assured me my mail would be there by the end of the next day.
That was Tuesday, so my mail should have arrived by Thursday. It didn't.
The local office manager (not his title, but you get the idea) called me this morning and chastised me for not getting my mail on a regular basis but said my mailman would deliver my mail to my door this one time but that if this ever happened again, I'd have to go to the post office to retrieve all my mail.
Getting a dressing down from a boss (or a parent!) isn't fun, but from a stranger? Infuriating. I wanted to yell at him that when he's lost his son and been through an emotional pregnancy and 4 months of blistered nipples he can judge me but until then, shut up.
I didn't say that, but politely said I understood and hung up.
Reviews for this particular USPS office are pretty horrid, and unless the person doing the job has changed recently, he has been receiving very bad reviews for awhile for general job incompetence. In addition, he had told someone at 1-800-ASK-USPS (who I had called initially) that he'd called me at home.
No such call ever happened, so he also lied.
Yeah.
Friday I called the local Post Office again and the man on the line said he'd drop it off on his way home from work. I happened to have the early afternoon off, so I decided to swing by and just get it on my own. At that point, it had been 2 weeks since we'd gotten any mail.
After waiting in line, then waiting by their blue door or doom (the one with a bolted window attached that makes me feel a little like Oliver from Oliver Twist), I was informed there was no mail for me.
The driver must have already grabbed it so I went home and waited.
And Waited.
And Waited.
He'd said it would be dropped off around 6pm but 6pm came and went without any knocks on the door or the doorbell ringing.
I was pretty mad and my husband wasn't happy, either.
At 7pm, the doorbell rang.
FINALLY!!!
For two weeks of mail, the bin was not very full, which I guess was a good thing. The most important piece of mail in there was a package I'd ordered for myself as part of my belated birthday present.
It was there and I've used it and it's wonderful!!
But that's for another post. *thspsthsp*