Stolen Package Blues
5I’ve had two packages stolen from the mail area of my apartment this week. Not sure if it was a fellow resident of my building, or an opportunistic thief who slipped in with another resident. This is the first time I’ve had any packages stolen, but it’s definitely made me re-think my usual habit of doing holiday shopping online this year.
Has anyone else cut back on their online shopping these days as a result of package thieves?
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nope… well maybe someone has, but not I.
also sorry about your stolen packages… that sucks.
People suck.
I’m sending more to Amazon lockers.
https://www.amazon.com/lockers
@Euniceandrich We have one of those nearby. I keep forgetting to use it.
also if anyone thinks “well my town doesn’t have any of those”… remember whole foods… I believe they have installed them in every whole foods by now.
@thismyusername Heck, the Target is closer than the Whole Foods. So much brick-and-mortar shopping is closer than the nearest locker to my location.
@PocketBrain If you are physically shopping at target I doubt you need to worry about packages being stolen from your porch… and if you do, quit leaving your bags o’ target purchases on your porch!
@thismyusername I was referring to the fact that brick-and-mortar shopping is more convenient to me (and many other people) than any amazon lockers location. It’s a good idea, but needs more locations to be convenient to everybody. Perhaps a partnership with FedEx to set up at their copy locations (formerly Kinko’s) would work.
I live in an apartment as well and after someone stole my welcome mat I’ve been having my stuff held at the local PO UPS/FedEx spot. It’s inconvenient, but I get my stuff.
Oh that sucks! Your apt bldg needs to put up a security cam. Stealing mail is a federal offense.
@lseeber Stealing USPS mail is a Felony, just stealing an Amazon package is not.US Code Section 1708
@rtharp01 Well… that sucks too then.
Ship stuff to your work address.
I have a friend who had stuff I sent her stolen on more than on occasion.
I send everything to her workplace now.
Oh, and my stolen stuff story is where the post office delivers stuff to the wrong address. I live on 12345 First St. A cross street, let’s call it Second St, has a house on it with the same numbers. 12345 Second St.
The mail person will deliver my packages to that address. It was okay until the old tenant moved out and a new tenant moved in.
The new tenant will open up the envelope, take out my widget and put the empty envelope back into the mailbox and within the next week, I get my envelope back, empty.
I put in a complaint about this, the supervisor at the post office said they have GPS now for where packages are actually delivered. He said they’d contact the “fine” people who stole my stuff.
Nothing expensive and Amazon made it all right.
@lisaviolet We had someone who first said the wife will drop off the package they got by mistake. Next was she took it to a different post office then she forgot and finally they never had it. It was a $200 camera that was part of a system and no use to the wrong person. The postmaster ended up having the postal inspectors send a letter explaining that it was wrong to keep something that didn’t belong to them and set a deadline to return it or they would be investigating further. It was back the day after the letter. Woman said she forgot about it and here take it.
People are something
@lisaviolet We have postal carriers that just don’t pay attn. (I hesitate to call them dumb, but if the shoe fits.) I often get mail for my neighbors. Same street, wrong numbers or same numbers, wrong street. Because I hate when my tracking says delivered and it doesn’t show up for days, I deliver it to my neighbors. It’s better imo to take the incompetence factor out all together and make sure people get their stuff. I guess I’m ok using incompetence because it happens weekly.
@lisaviolet Just so you know, The Post Office geo-tracks every delivery. If an item shows as being delivered and you didn’t get it, call your local post office.
@lisaviolet @rtjhnstn however if the postal worker is dishonest they could show up on your porch so GPS says they were there and then carry it right back off the porch.
Last week the postal worker decided delivering the mail was not on the to do list. The next day she delivered the current day’s mail but not the previous day’s as she “didn’t have time” (and was seriously bitchy about it when asked - basically all but told us to fuck off; we’d get our mail when she had time). I rounded up several people to complain in the right places (post office general’s complaint system and the local post office supervisor) and the manager of the apartment building next to us (they experienced the same thing) and bingo. The next day all the mail was delivered - old and new. The usps e-mail system that emails scans of the front of most of what is coming is what even clued me in that something was up with mail delivery.
@rtjhnstn This is nice to know and I’m curious to see if these “fine” people keep any more of our mail.
The supervisor was not happy to find out that the carrier brought the empty envelope back to our house. (She’d already delivered to our house, then came back with the envelope - flap open and empty inside.)
@Kidsandliz @lisaviolet @rtjhnstn I get the same occasional email showing what should be delivered, but doesn’t arrive in the mailbox until a day or two later. I also used to get scanned images of packages, but now there’s just a generic image indicating a “mailpiece” was included in the mail, instead of being on the package dashboard and you can’t select it as missing mail when it doesn’t show up! I think I read recently that they plan to hike rates again too!
KuoH
@kuoh January 27 up a nickle for a letter. A few things the same, a couple going down and many other things going up.
@kuoh @lisaviolet @rtjhnstn I get them every day for that day. The only ones that I get that are a generic scan is when it’s some sort of promotional junk mail usually.
Since it’s the holiday season, here’s my story: I ordered a Lego winter village set for my kid who was maybe 8 at the time. It was supposed to be delivered by Fedex and he was so excited he sat on the front porch waiting for an hour. No box. We were very sad. Our county, in all their wisdom, has the same 5 digit address on St and Ct and it went to the wrong one (and they’re a couple of miles apart). Within an hour of giving up there was a knock at the door- the person who lived on Ct said it looked important and drove it over to us. So everyone doesn’t suck. Thanks neighbor.
@sammydog01 Nice! There’s hope. I had florist deliver flowers meant for me to a different house. They were gonna keep them 'til I banged on the door the next day and got them. Hubby (before he was hubby) had sent them.
And I just had a big box that I can barely lift dumped right in front of my door (couldn’t open the door) and it doesn’t belong to me. Couldn’t call the delivery people to tell them cuz it was just some guy in a uhaul truck (pkg says UPS… ha). Fortunately, found a ph number on box that was the person it should have gone to. She’ll be picking it up in a while.
So, is ups hiring any tom, dick or harry with wheels now?
@lseeber I remember reading something last year that they rent trucks to keep up with the mail flow during the holidays. I think they are still ups drivers though.
I could be wrong, of course.
@RiotDemon I figured it was probably something to that effect.
@lseeber UPS and FedEx around here both rent trucks when the holiday season comes.
The other day I met the UPS guy in the driveway as he was climbing down out of the back of a Ryder box truck. I asked him if they were trying to make his job easier - this truck is not at all easy to climb in and out of, the back bumper was about the height of a pickup truck and it’s just a box truck so there’s no access from the cab. It’s a climb every time with that setup.
He was definitely a UPS employee, just stuck with a crappy truck. He wasn’t too happy about it, either.
@djslack I’ll bet. I don’t know what it’s like now but yrs ago… if a UPS driver had any kind of a wreck (even a slight fender bender) according to the guy that spoke to my husband, you got fired. I felt that was very unfair considering the amount of driving they had to do (even if they do play soccer in back of those trucks). Dunno if the policy still exists but, I wonder if they have anything like that going with those rentals?
@lseeber @RiotDemon USPS rents out their trucks to other services on Sundays, an efficient use of resources. Otherwise they’d sit in the lot.
@OldCatLady @RiotDemon huh. Never seen one out on a Sunday. And, I’m surprised considering they used to fire drivers if there was any sort of accident. I’m guessing they must have finally suspended that ridiculous rule.
I just had a large box delivered. I looked at the camera and the UPS delivery person had pulled my trash dumpster thing around to the porch to block the view from the street. That was nice of them.
My spouse saw the same guy delivering to a neighbor today and he asked if we got the package ok. He was very concerned about it. I had already sent a general contact email to UPS corporate expressing thanks for the extra effort.
@medz My UPS dumped my box at the curb yesterday. I think he was intimidated by my 13 year old arthritic dog who was asleep in the yard.
@sammydog01 My cat is around 13 years old and is not to be trifled with.
Guess it is time to install a camera… I have packages delivered alllll the time, to the point somedays, you cannot open my front door the packages are so high. I have NEVER had a package stolen before. Alas, I am missing an entire day’s worth of packages from the USPS. I am missing the AAA batteries from Meh, for poor kids toys
, my son’s birthday present from morningsave, which is today, (cool looking watch), and a box o crap from thatdaily deal.
Since they all say delivered, I am SOL, right?
@mikibell p.s. my mailbox is one of the check points on the route, so I have to believe they were delivered, since the mail person scans the barcode at least twice a day
@mikibell Do you get the “Informed Delivery Daily Digest” emails from USPS? (https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.action)
It emails you with what you should be getting that day and has a mechanism to report missing mail pieces. Did you get any normal mail (letters) that day?
Yes, you’re probably hosed, but I have had an instance where things were marked delivered, but they didn’t actually deliver them until the next day. (not sure why it happened)
@medz Thank you, I do not get usps notifications. I am not sure about normal mail. I have children who unpredictably check the mail and leave it whereever it is convenient. I checked all the normal places they dump stuff, and the box of crap shouldn’t have been THAT small, and a bit heavy, so I don’t think I could overlook them
It has been almost a week, I am just discovering the extent of the theft as I look up to see when meh would be delivering the items I expected. It takes a bit of time to get to the east coast (not a complaint, but hard to remember).
@mikibell Still call the PO and let them know. Or… whoever delivers. How many times have we read that a postal employee was arrested and found with thousands of undelivered packages and mail in their apt or home? Sometimes it alerts them to a problem.
@lseeber as soon as I finish interrogating my children, I will let the PO know. I am still hopeful that they put the packages somewhere. I don’t want to believe someone took my packages – I am a crazy optimist!!
@medz hahhahahhaha FYI
https://thehackernews.com/2018/11/usps-data-breach.html
@mikibell LOLOLOLOL FYI
“We currently have no information that this vulnerability was leveraged to exploit customer records.”
“Out of an abundance of caution, the Postal Service is further investigating to ensure that anyone who may have sought to access our systems inappropriately is pursued to the fullest extent of the law.”