Done
I love my job. I do. I fully realize how amazing it is that I get to do this for a living. I am absolutely stunned (and more than a little touched) by just how many of you have helped me be able to do this. My life rocks.
That said, I would very much like not to go to the post office tomorrow. Maybe not the day after that either. You see this little basket? It’s full of the receipts and customs forms I’ve gotten from the post office since Wednesday. Several of those receipts are a few inches longer than I am tall. I am not short.
The process of getting these mailed has been a bit…surreal. I expected it to be time consuming, even occasionally tedious. I expected actually hauling the books about to be a bit tiring. I didn’t expect the post office to be so deeply and consistently opposed to actually mailing things.
I knew this would be a big undertaking, so I tried really hard to make it go smoothly. I used good sturdy envelopes and printed the address labels so there would be no difficulties with my questionable hand writing. I filled out dozens and dozens and dozens of customs forms. I took an envelope with the book in it to the post office a few days before the bulk of the books arrived to find out what postage I would need. I bought ALL the appropriate stamps available at three different post offices, and pre-stamped as many of the packages as I possibly could. I even asked if I could make an appointment to bring the packages in at a specific time so they’d be ready for me. They said no. So I asked when they were least busy so I could be sure to come then.
I showed up bright and early (as suggested), and hauled the first batch in. I explained that I had lots of things to mail, but that I’d done everything I could to help make it as painless as possible. Somehow, it didn’t work. Within about 2 minutes I was told ‘the post office isn’t the place to mail things,’ ‘you can’t mail stuff like this at the post office,’ ‘we don’t take this much mail,’ and (my personal favorite) ‘no one is allowed to mail more than 10 packages at a time.’ I was floored.
I feel it’s important to mention that I was there early enough that there was no one in line behind me. Just as important, I said that, if a line did start to form, we could take a break and let people go ahead of me. I certainly didn’t want anyone to wait behind me for ages when they just needed to mail one little thing.
I’m afraid I had to be rather…insistent. Polite (always polite…it’s much more effective than the alternative), but insistent.
I apologized for misunderstanding. Surely I hadn’t actually heard them say that the post office wasn’t for mailing things. Goodness me, I must not be understanding properly. They certainly weren’t telling me that I couldn’t mail my packages. That would just be unheard of. I’m sorry, are you saying I can’t mail this here, because that would be really surprising. Ah, so I can mail things here. Excellent.
Oh, so you want me to mail 10 and then come back the next day? Unfortunately that won’t work, I need to mail them all. It is unavoidable. Yes, really. Yes, all of them. No, I couldn’t possibly leave until they are safely in the mail. Because it simply isn’t possible. Because it isn’t. Because they need to go out today. Yes, all of them. Because they do. Oh, there’s a policy that says I can’t mail more than 10? Could I please see that in writing, I’d very much like to have a copy of that. Yes, I’ll be happy to wait while you check with your manager. Ah, so I can mail them then. Marvelous, thank you so much.
Each and every trip to the post office (that’s two on Wednesday, two on Thursday, and one today). I am not impressed. The books are now all safely mailed though, despite the objections of the post office. Next time…next time I’ll have to make a different plan.
Stories like this always stomp on a little piece of my heart. I’m very pro-Mail (Getting. Receiving. It’s existence, really.) but I can’t compassionately explain away ‘the post office isn’t the place to mail things’/‘you can’t mail stuff like this at the post office’. Wth, USPS? Why don’t you want us to love you?
But my book did arrive today and it is beautiful. 🙂
simply amazing. I am at a loss for other words.
And you wonder why they’re going broke!
Well, having placed a late order for the paper version this week, I’m feeling a little guilty. I apologize in advance for making you have to go through this yet again.
Clearly you stepped through some sort of time/space continuum warp thing and ended up in Canada. Because surely no one at the USPS would say that the post office isn’t for mailing things. That’s clearly the voice of Canada Post speaking.
You guys are awesome, it’s fabulous to hear I’m not the only one surprised to hear that the post office isn’t for mailing things!
And please don’t apologize. It’s not a big deal to go with a small stack of things, I think it was just the baskets and baskets and baskets that brought out the crazy talk. I totally don’t mind going…I just don’t want to take hundreds of books a day and have the same fight every day! I’m actually looking forward to going and it being a smooth and easy process…just maybe not tomorrow!
Wow, perhaps time to file a complaint with someone higher up when all is done? No wonder they’re losing money. I mean, this could make an interesting news story…
You might consider sending a polite letter to your Congressional representative, sending a copy to your local and regional Post Masters.
I had a neighbor who sold used text books, and he had an arrangement, where his postal carrier picked up the crates of mail (with postage) at his house.
I have been watching this tale with interest, Customer Service appears to be an outlandish notion to your Post Office, Perhaps they could take a lesson from our Post Office – they’ll come to the customer and collect the packets. A one-off collection costs the princely sum of £14 (plus Value Added Tax)
That must sound quite like Heaven to you right now.
A regular service can cost as little as £230 per annum.
http://www.royalmail.com/delivery/outbound-mail/customer-collections/prices
The Royal Mail has its problems, but they do know how to treat customers.
Wow. Just wow. But what do you expect, trying to do something as crazy as post something from the post office?? Or in this case, a lot of somethings. Good on you for staying polite but firm in your quest to mail packages from the place where you should expect to be able to mail packages.
Received the book. It’s awesome – despite having seen the electronic version months ago! Have you considered mailing these through paypal? Didn’t we pay you via paypal? You could have easily created a mailing label and you didn’t have to type or copy and pasted the addresses. It also chargers delivery confirmation for a mere 19 cents vs the 75 cents they charge at the post offic. Once you have these printed out, you have to tape them to your package. Then, you put the stack outside your house and call the Post Office – they have an 800 number and someone will come and pick them up from your house to be mailed via the Post Office!!
Paypal does let you do that, the only problem is they make you use priority shipping which, for items of this size and shape and weight, is considerably more expensive. The difference in doing it that way and taking them to the post office was well over a thousand dollars for the initial shipment, and I couldn’t quite justify it for this project. Definitely something to keep in mind going forward though!