USPS Informed Delivery
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@idzy said in USPS Informed Delivery:
If you're talking about AusPost. I really do have to disagree.
I am not. I should have been more clear. I am an American and our USPS is total shit.
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@Polygeekery
It was mostly a cost-cutting measure to do away with it. To improve the usefulness and consistency of their tracking systems (
), and to reduce the rate of misdeliveries (), the USPS changed so that everything has to be computer scanned and barcoded with the new systems. Which were so expensive that they couldn't be practically installed in branch offices, even in larger cities... so everything goes to the regional sort facility regardless of source or destination, to be sorted, distributed, and delivered.
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@izzion We're kinda lucky, even though we've got a huge land mass, virtually all of it is uninhabitable (and therefore uninhabited). For the most part Australia is highly urbanized, with the vast majority of the population living in 5 or 6 major cities, so it's not particularly hard. For regional service, they have all the necessary tech to work with the system (as we've got 4G coverage of most of the uninhabited land-mass just for fun), a small problem is that their postage needs are met via light aircraft which generally runs 3 days per week.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Another postal service
that the USPS is likely innocent for:Some services like FedEx Smartpost will deliver between cities and then use USPS for last mile delivery.
FedEx / UPS / DHL were a gigantic pain in the ass when I was using a PO Box.
Buy something online. Give them my PO Box as the shipping address.
Sorry, FedEx/UPS/DHL cannot ship to a PO Box.OK. No problem. Give them my street address. Package is shipped with FedEx/UPS/DHL who takes it part of the way and then hands it off to USPS for last mile delivery. Except I didn't have a mailbox at my house, so USPS is allowed to say:
Fuck You. If you don't have a mailbox we don't have to deliver anything to you.And the package is returned to the sender.
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@Gribnit Not really. It's privatized in the sense that it is now listed on the ASX (Australian Stock Exchange), but it still retains all the same pseudo-monopolist rights it did when it was the "Post Master General's Office" back in colonial times, as well as government funding. But the company's progressive leadership had it diversify into things other than simply postage, providing pre-paid credit cards for travel, cell phones, assorted office supplies, international mail forwarding, and were one of the first to introduce the notion of a 24/7 parcel pickup locker way back in the the early 2000s.
Furthermore, they have publicly announced that they see their future as the last mile delivery and pick-up arm of e-commerce operations, rather than traditional mail, and have focused on this quite a lot. My wife's business has a great service from them for international exports, where they will automatically select the best international carrier (by price or speed at your option) with nice REST APIs for your website to provide quotes (helping her get this working was my well-rewarded contribution to her business, and took less than an hour)
So they've encouraged innovation, and from second hand knowledge (from people who actually work there), run several good development teams.
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@Gribnit Just look at google maps. Inland Australia is nothing but desert as far as the eye can see. No precipitation, and no lakes. Though some people can endure it, it's not many.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
No there aren't. Today is Sunday.
USPS delivers on Sunday sometimes.
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This post is deleted!
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@idzy said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Our biggest problems are that delivery drivers are lazy and will assume nobody is home at a residential address to receive parcels midweek.
I don't know how it works in Australia, but here I've heard that they set unreasonable objectives for drivers (to increase profit, of course) so they have to "cheat" that way not to run late.
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@idzy said in USPS Informed Delivery:
But the company's progressive leadership had it diversify into things other than simply postage, providing pre-paid credit cards for travel, cell phones, assorted office supplies, international mail forwarding, and were one of the first to introduce the notion of a 24/7 parcel pickup locker way back in the the early 2000s.
The best thing is that unlike Czech Post, AusPost doesn't force any of those services upon you. If I walk in with a parcel and ask to send it, they ask me whether I want tracking on it, not if I want to open a fucking bank account.
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@Tsaukpaetra said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
No there aren't. Today is Sunday.
USPS delivers on Sunday sometimes.
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago. This morning I got my daily spam from Informed Delivery telling me I had a package coming today. On Sunday? Since when does the post office deliver mail on Sunday?
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
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@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Since when does the post office deliver mail on Sunday?
Since about two years ago I think. But only sometimes, and only for some packages. I don't know the rules....
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@Tsaukpaetra said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Since when does the post office deliver mail on Sunday?
Since about two years ago I think. But only sometimes, and only for some packages. I don't know the rules....
TIL:
Apparently, it started in 2014, for Amazon packages.
Amazon Sunday delivery: Key facts to know as USPS rolls out service nationally
The U.S. Postal Service is known for working through rain, sleet and snow, but not on Sundays or holidays, right? That is changing, quickly, through a
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@Tsaukpaetra said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Since when does the post office deliver mail on Sunday?
Since about two years ago I think. But only sometimes, and only for some packages. I don't know the rules....
I think it is basically only Amazon packages that will be delivered on Sundays.
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@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago.
[…]
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
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@dkf said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago.
[…]
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
I've ordered on eBay and received the goods from Amazon before.
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@dkf said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago.
[…]
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
Yes, that was my reaction, also.
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@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@dkf said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago.
[…]
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
Yes, that was my reaction, also.
My head remained un-tilted. USPS doesn't care what box you happen to be shipping it in, I've re-used Amazon packing materials in the past.
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@Tsaukpaetra said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@dkf said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I bought an item on Ebay a couple of days ago.
[…]
Later, I found a package, with Amazon Prime logo on it, in my mailbox.
Yes, that was my reaction, also.
My head remained un-tilted. USPS doesn't care what box you happen to be shipping it in, I've re-used Amazon packing materials in the past.
It's not the packing material that surprised me -- you can ship items in just about any sort of package you want. I just wasn't expecting an item purchased on Ebay to be delivered on Sunday -- USPS normally only does that for Amazon.
What a crazy world we live in.
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@Gribnit said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@idzy Well now you've gone and awakened a privatization boner the likes of which you may not have been prepared to reckon with
It's okay, we have Telstra too
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@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
It's not the packing material that surprised me -- you can ship items in just about any sort of package you want. I just wasn't expecting an item purchased on Ebay to be delivered on Sunday -- USPS normally only does that for Amazon.
What a crazy world we live in.
Depends on how they figure out which packages to deliver - it would not surprise me if your local post office just looks for the swoosh on the side instead of closely scrutinizing the return address.
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@Unperverted-Vixen said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
It's not the packing material that surprised me -- you can ship items in just about any sort of package you want. I just wasn't expecting an item purchased on Ebay to be delivered on Sunday -- USPS normally only does that for Amazon.
What a crazy world we live in.
Depends on how they figure out which packages to deliver - it would not surprise me if your local post office just looks for the swoosh on the side instead of closely scrutinizing the return address.
Nah, they just look for barcode. I had a package that was delivered to me, reused to ship out, return again because I didn't sufficiently obscure the original label. Somehow they decided that the older scratched out but-not-all-of-the-barcode label was more valid than the pristine label.
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@El_Heffe said in USPS Informed Delivery:
It's not the packing material that surprised me -- you can ship items in just about any sort of package you want. I just wasn't expecting an item purchased on Ebay to be delivered on Sunday -- USPS normally only does that for Amazon.
If they're also set up as a seller on Amazon, they can use Fulfillment by Amazon to send their eBay sales.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
No there aren't. Today is Sunday.
This is the kind of stuff that makes me wonder what kind of clusterfuck this whole system is.
Those four pieces of mail that USPS Informed Delivery said would be delivered on Sunday, they up and vanished like a fart in the wind.
I am convinced that message does not reflect reality and is just a
math.random()function.
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@Polygeekery
The Sunday mail was delivered on the PO's version of Sunday
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
No there aren't. Today is Sunday.
This is the kind of stuff that makes me wonder what kind of clusterfuck this whole system is.
Those four pieces of mail that USPS Informed Delivery said would be delivered on Sunday, they up and vanished like a fart in the wind.
I am convinced that message does not reflect reality and is just a
math.random()function.Or an uncertainty principle was left unobserved and changed while you weren't looking.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I am convinced that message does not reflect reality and is just a
math.random()function.Maybe you will eventually receive an email saying they have -3 mailpieces and NaN packages.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
No there aren't. Today is Sunday.
This is the kind of stuff that makes me wonder what kind of clusterfuck this whole system is.
Those four pieces of mail that USPS Informed Delivery said would be delivered on Sunday, they up and vanished like a fart in the wind.
I am convinced that message does not reflect reality and is just a
math.random()function.Well, since Yesterday says "4" and we all know what xkcd says...
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@loopback0 said in USPS Informed Delivery:
I've ordered on eBay and received the goods from Amazon before.
This happened again today.
Ordered from eBay on Friday, came today in Amazon packaging sealed with Amazon tape, with an Amazon label and an Amazon return address. Clearly from Amazon.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Either our citizens are too stupid ... or our postal workers are too dumb/lazy
One may never find a better opportunity for a "why not both?" meme. Unfortunately, I'm on mobile, so you'll just have to pretend I posted one here.
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@PleegWat said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Over here, mail deposit boxes universally have two slits - one for local mail, and a separate one for non-local mail. Though there was best-effort overnight delivery either way.
We used to have that. Either our citizens are too stupid to use it or our postal workers are too dumb/lazy to use them so they went away and were replaced with just one box.
I still see them around, but they are rarer than they used to be.
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@idzy said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@Gribnit No precipitation, and no lakes. Though some people can endure it, it's not many.
But they'd be most likely to use 4G!
Judging from "Crocodile Dundee" anyway.
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@PleegWat said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Over here, mail deposit boxes universally have two slits - one for local mail, and a separate one for non-local mail.
There's possibly something there to be said about double-slit thing and quantum nonlocality of your mail, but I'm not clever enough to make it into a proper joke...
Not that it's
.
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I have been meaning to make this thread for a while simply because there is so much content to be posted.
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Zoom. Enhance.
Found the problem.
Or a problem rather.
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@JazzyJosh said in USPS Informed Delivery:
They don't take images of flats, they just process the address label. I'm assuming these were magazines or large envelopes?
Languages are ... amusing. I read this sentence and wondered
it was talking about, before realising that "flats" here does not mean "apartments". The clue was the other post:@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
The missing pieces of mail are not always flats or packages.
Oh, flat pieces of post. Got it.
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@Zerosquare said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@Deadfast said in USPS Informed Delivery:
Oh, and they like to raise their prices every year because "fewer and fewer people send mail". I'm not very good at economics, but I'm pretty sure supply & demand doesn't work that way.Actually, it does, sometimes. (That doesn't mean it's an honest explanation, here though.) They're not providing a raw good, they're providing a service. So there are doubtless some efficiencies from mass quantities. Consider: the time spent per letter for a mailman delivering 100 letters to a block as opposed to one letter per block.
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@jinpa said in USPS Informed Delivery:
They're not providing a raw good, they're providing a
productservice.FTFY
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@Polygeekery said in USPS Informed Delivery:
USPS website
The last time I moved, I did my change-of-address through the USPS website. The street address field had a broken validator that failed regardless of any input, e.g. "Please enter only numbers in this field" after I'd put in e.g. "11829".
I tried a few times over several days in case they updated the site. It never changed. Eventually, I used my browser developer tools to remove the broken JavaScript validator and everything submitted and worked just fine.
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@jinpa said in USPS Informed Delivery:
So there are doubtless some efficiencies from mass quantities. Consider: the time spent per letter for a mailman delivering 100 letters to a block as opposed to one letter per block.
True, but raising the prices as a result causes a positive feedback loop: even fewer people will use the service, so the price will increase more, and so on until it's no longer profitable to keep it running.
So, either:
a) they're idiots, or
b) they assume their only remaining customers are captive, and they're trying to milk them as much as possible before their business collapses
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@Zerosquare said in USPS Informed Delivery:
@jinpa said in USPS Informed Delivery:
So there are doubtless some efficiencies from mass quantities. Consider: the time spent per letter for a mailman delivering 100 letters to a block as opposed to one letter per block.
True, but raising the prices as a result causes a positive feedback loop: even fewer people will use the service, so the price will increase more, and so on until it's no longer profitable to keep it running.
So, either:
a) they're idiots, or
b) they assume their only remaining customers are captive, and they're trying to milk them as much as possible before their business collapsesI used to help develop costing software. As the owner would say, "Costing is a science, pricing is an art."
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Ordered something that's being shipped via DPD. DPD are normally quite good - they provide a 2 hour window when the delivery leaves the depot and you can track it and as the driver gets closer it narrows it down to a 15 minute window. Normally this is accurate.
The item was marked as dispatched yesterday and I got an email from DPD yesterday saying they were going to deliver the parcel today.
Today their tracking site shows they don't even have the parcel yet.
