Media reports and ads from security companies suggest that a lot of holiday packages get stolen. BUT is the problem as common as they say, OR is the Post Office faking deliveries?
I begin with my own experience but refer to other similar reports below.
What happens when Amazon notifies you that a package was delivered as reported by the US Postal Service (USPS) but there is no sign of the package?
This happens periodically to me and others. It again happened to me on November 1. By the fourth, I am still waiting for the package to show up and have once again begun the familiar complaint procedure.
The package might have been stolen, but that is extremely unlikely because it physically couldn’t have been put in my mailbox as reported to me, as I explain below.
Was this a false delivery report because the driver didn’t want to drive to the house, or was it left on the ground or tied to the mailbox and I should report this to police as a stolen package? I know it wasn’t left at my door because the USPS tracking notice says it is in the mailbox. Besides, the surveillance cameras and alarm show no one was at the house that day.
This is an exact copy of the notice:
“Delivered Wednesday Package was left inside the residence’s mailbox” USPS Amazon notification.
I have to deal with this sort of problem every few months and I recently found that it happens a lot! Social media is filled with similar complaints and not just in the holiday season.
USPS Drivers Ordered to Falsify Delivery Reports
There are news reports based on driver complaints, that USPS supervisors have required drivers in the Atlanta, Georgia (U.S.A.) area to falsify package delivered reports. The supervisors would probably do this to protect their gigantic contract with Amazon which guarantees two day delivery for Prime members on many orders. Details are difficult to come by but judging by what you can see on porches it is obvious that Amazon must be the largest customer of the USPS.
The CBS TV Atlanta affiliate reports that drivers have been ordered to fake deliveries – denied by USPS and often difficult to prove since some packages do get stolen.
https://www.cbs46.com/news/mail-carriers-accuse-usps-of-faking-amazon-delivery-records-so/article_5b4b48f0-cfc6-5b5a-8731-21cd4bc13a55.html
USPS representatives have denied this, saying the reports are false – possibly taking their cue from President Trump who has actually bragged on camera that he lies when it is easier. Certainly, when The President indicates that lying for convenience is perfectly OK, it will trickle down.
Donald Trump Admits He Only Tells the Truth ‘When I Can’ – Newsweek
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-tell-truth-lies-1196677
In my case, I have absolute proof that a package marked as “delivered to customer mailbox” was a falsified report. Proof seldom exists because a package left at a door could have been stolen. But I know I was lied to. Many others probably couldn’t PROVE their case.
How can I possibly know? Simple, my mail to the house is either dropped at the house (the usual procedure for packages) OR left in a small regulation rural mailbox at the end of a driveway which services three houses.
The package and delivery in this instance (this happens periodically) couldn’t have been left in the mailbox for two reasons.
First, the mailbox was completely filled by another delivery made at the same time – multiple Amazon orders arrived at the same time by the same driver.
Second, even if the box hadn’t already been stuffed full seconds earlier, the fake delivery included a 5 lb. bag of organic dried vegetables AND several other items so all by itself that part of the order couldn’t fit in the mailbox even if that had been the only delivery.
Therefore the delivery notice was false.
We, therefore, know the USPS makes false delivery claims.
Trump False Complaints About Amazon
Although President Trump has falsely claimed Amazon is cheating the USPS, if that were true, WHY would the USPS be working so hard to keep and even renew the recently expired contract? Also, the USPS denies amazon is costing it money.
The fact is that it costs the USPS very little more to deliver all those Amazon packages and makes a nice profit from the Amazon contract since they already claim to and actually do deliver to virtually every U.S. address every day (as a USPS TV ad correctly claims). Getting paid scores or even hundreds of dollars MORE to EVERY delivery driver just to add a few more boxes to their car or company truck is obviously a big profit incentive.
In fact, if the USPS loses the contract with the world’s largest retailer there are reports that it may be impossible to continue many services, even ending Saturday deliveries – in the past few years but BEFORE obtaining the Amazon contract, many smaller rural USPS offices have been closed. That occurred in two towns near me, although not in my nearby post office (close, but not delivering to my ZIPcode location which is serviced by a Post Office 15 miles distant).
(If interested, the closed office in the small town of Valier, PA was in a rental property while the even smaller town near me had a new building owned by the USPS – so this made perfect financial sense. Even the local office is now closed all but a few hours daily instead of being open all day.)
Amazon Takes Control
Amazon is apparently getting fed up with the USPS placing late delivery blame on the giant retailer (costing them refunds and harming customer relations) and my case also proves it is the USPS, not Amazon which is at fault, part of the order was delivered and the rest was in the same carrier’s car because they had to scan the package IN THE CAR to falsely report the delivery.
Amazon often gives good customers perks or even refunds when a Prime package in the U.S. isn’t delivered within two days.
The Financial Times reports that Amazon is rolling out their own delivery service in cities while in smaller locations Amazon is licensing independent drivers to make company deliveries – both threatening the USPS near monopoly. For those who didn’t know, Amazon often ships UPS but UPS then drops the package at the nearest Post Office for final delivery to the customer.
Financial Times report on an Amazon move away from USPS
https://www.ft.com/content/d93565c4-7bd9-11e8-bc55-50daf11b720d
UPS and FedX used to handle Amazon deliveries and I experienced almost no problems with them since 1999 when I began using Amazon – I am severely disabled and live in a very rural area, making trips to Walmart, for example, a complex and difficult process. Actual home delivery can be vitally important to the disabled or elderly and much more so to the elderly disabled.
Why This Matters
Although not getting a package in two days is sometimes annoying, it isn’t a big deal, or is it? Of course, it might be important, even vitally important for anyone who accepts an insurance company’s offer of discounted 3-month drug delivery by mail, but they can always refuse this service and there is usually a local pharmacy so they may just is there a more general problem?
First, understand that every day people make police reports of stolen packages when they are told by the USPS that something was delivered – it often turns out to just be a delayed delivery and a USPS lie, but needlessly ties up police resources anyway.
Second, personally, and I can’t be the only one, being in a wheelchair and told that a package containing food was delivered but it isn’t where reported, I am faced with the choice of letting the package get soaked or snowed under (the fake deliveries usually occur in bad weather) if it was left on the ground by the mailbox, or struggling out into a storm and up a steep driveway to search for a package.
Third, unfortunately, it happens that in rural areas there really isn’t pharmacy delivery, or delivery from supermarkets, or even pizza shops.
This falsified delivery problem happened before and first I notified the driver quietly and personally. I kept complaining quietly and it kept happening, eventually, I filed complaints with the postal inspectors and forwarded a complaint to the local Post Master (he apologized, said it was a mistake). I also complained to the agency which is charged with investigating discrimination against the disabled. The Department of Justice rejected the complaint and referred me back to the Post Office, and this continues to happen.
(I wrote the very first major book, 442 pages, about disability technology and the Americans with Disability Act back in 1993 “Computers and the Americans With Disabilities Act: A Manager’s Guide” – July 1, 1993, Windcrest McGraw-Hill, my Amazon site has commendation letters from a former governor of Texas and Johns Hopkins University for my work on disability rights.) https://www.amazon.com/John-A.-McCormick/e/B00287RNFS
On one particularly blatant occasion I was told by the Post Master that this can happen when a driver pulls up to the mailbox and marks ALL the packages, even ones many times larger than the box, as delivered, THEN discovers to their UTTER astonishment that they couldn’t actually put a 3’x3’x4′ box into a tiny 6″x4″x5″ mailbox but couldn’t change the delivery notice once they noticed.
Lie upon lie and remember there are media reports that the actual mail carriers are NOT to BLAME, they are ordered to falsify their reports.
Amazon’s Response
I want to emphasize that although Amazon is involved, AMAZON is definitely NOT at fault and has always been as helpful as possible when this occurs. I have seen social media reports from others in similar situations who also insist that the fault isn’t Amazon’s.
NOTE Prime members get “guaranteed” second-day delivery which is why this is such a critical matter for the Post Office which is under contract to meet the delivery times.
I also want to point out that most of the time I wouldn’t care if the package was a day late, certainly not as much as I care about being lied to repeatedly.
When I faxed a complaint to the local Postmaster asking whether I should report the package to the local State Police, OR Postal Inspectors, or both, the box miraculously showed up in a few hours, 5 days late.
My Background in Shipping?
Now, perhaps I should demonstrate my knowledge of the USPS. I was formerly in charge of shipping and receiving for a large computer company, worked in the traffic department of a major TV station/network (traffic is the mail room), and my father was a Post Master. The Post Office was in our house and both my mother and I occasionally served as clerk-in-charge.
That may not make me an expert, but I certainly know a lot more about USPS procedures and bureaucracy than the average person so they can’t push me around easily.
Regarding President Trump’s tirade and campaign against Amazon, having worked as a columnist for Post-Newsweek, I follow what is happening at The Washington Post and took note when Amazon’s head Jeff Bezos purchased the publishing empire that The President would find a way to retaliate.
