US Post Office Warning

I am sending coins to PCGS soon and I'm a little worried about the "middle man" in the sending process. So I was sort of looking around at post office related topics, didn't even think to look at the age of the thread. What really threw me was how OP seemed to have been out of luck due to an otherwise common part of delivery confirmation, the signature confirmation notice that is (or is not) left at the door of residences. Insurance, tracking, signature confirmation, OP says all the bases were covered and still got the shaft. Scary stuff. Sorry if I bumped an ancient thread, wasn't my intention.

A couple of years ago we did our taxes in February, and by November we still did not get our refund. Went around and around with the IRS both on the phone and in person. All we got was excuses that the IRS had a lot of identity theft/fraudulent returns and over a certain $ amount they where all being reviewed by hand. Finally my wife called our congressman, and a week later we had our refund... So the contact your congressman/woman can work...

What I find scary about this whole thing is how often it is happening. This is not just an isolated incident.

Through the local 'Nextdoor' site I have been seeing posts every month about articles supposedly being received yet the recipients have not seen hide nor hair of the item.

Then there was my own personal experience. I moved to the USA in Jan 2016 and our USPS delivery person was good, according to my US wife no issues at all in many many years. That all changed when USPS moved her to another area. Over a period of 8 months I personally took incorrectly delivered articles to the right address no less than 12 times.

In the interim I spoke twice to the delivery person, to no avail, then 3 times to the local postmaster. I have quite a good relationship with my local post office as I am there a lot and have the gift of the gab, so the post master tried to help, but with the Postal Union protections in place there is very little that can be done if an employee isn't doing their job properly, short of fraud (getting caught that is) it seems that they can keep their jobs with impunity.

The crap hit the fan when the worst case scenario happened. My first major coin purchase 1200 coins cost me $550. I waited for the delivery and no show, yet got the dreaded 'item received, left at street box'. After 2 official complaints online and 2 in person the item finally showed up around 2 weeks later, so I was happy with the outcome as you can imagine.

One thing I found out, that may not have been applicable to the original 2014 post, is that now when your items are scanned at delivery the GPS co-ordinates of the delivery are saved, so they post master can actually check by downloading the information to see where the item really went... That information to me is priceless as I reckon that is how they found my collection.

If the postal delivery person is the one stealing valuable packages, all they have to do is sit in their truck, scan the item and not put it in the mail box. Then drive down the street or somewhere and put it in an accomplice's mailbox.

Anyone who buys coins from the RCM can spot their boxes a mile away. My mailman says he knows of several collectors on his route.

Altho the USPS has damaged some of my coins due to rough handling, as yet have not had a problem with having the coin delivered to a p.o. box at the local branch and it requires a signature.

The kicker is that I share my brother's p.o. box and when he gets a delivery notice, I am always out of town, so he goes to the delivery window, shows his i.d. (we share the same last name but not the first) and gets the package.

Not once has the post office said to my brother "hey, your name is different than on the delivery notice" and refused to hand the package over. I guess the post office assumes that since you are holding the notice in your hand and you show an i.d. with the same last name, it is good as gone. It does not appear that the post office looks at the first name on both the delivery notice and the i.d. to see if it an exact match... or if by simply showing an i.d., they do not read it at all... just having the notice and showing an i.d. is good enough.

I have had much worse luck with ground delivery, such as UPS or FedEx... once they delivered an expensive package to the wrong address. The tracking showed that it had been delivered. When I called up UPS to see if the route driver could show me where he actually delivered the package, the UPS employee laughed and hung up on me. (There are several homes on the property of my delivery address and do not read the simple instructions on exactly where to take the package. I once went literally running after a FedEx truck who had entered the property as I was expecting the delivery on the same day and kept an eagle eye on the property entrance. The truck naturally went to the wrong house and I had to chase it down. This was involving a VERY expensive coin. Their attitudes are "hey, its not mine".

Most items that require a signature can be signed for by anybody, and they typically don't have to show id. If you want to only allow a specific person to sign for an item you have to use restricted delivery which cost significantly more. In theory Registered mail is supposed to require an ID for delivery, but I have never been asked for it.

A person has basically no control over some unstable and/or vindictive person (disgruntled employee, former business partner, ex-spouse etc.) mailing a letter or package to your home address. Because you have no control you have plausible deniability and are not held responsible for contents of said letter or package.

When signing up for informed delivery you are doing it willfully and giving your consent. The sign-up process is hugely flawed especially in regards to them confirming your identity. One scary huge flaw is that some unstable and/or vindictive person can sign you up, without you knowing and there's a large time gap between you finding this out and correcting it.

In essence this informeddelivery service forfeits a private individual's legal plausible deniability (which we've always taken for granted because it's common sense) forever whether you sign up for the service or not.

I'm sure you all can come to your own conclusions about the issues applicable with opening up this "can of worms".

Nice, normal human beings focus, with good faith, on the key features and perceived benefits with a false sense of security.

Potential bad actors read the "fine print" seeking opportunity.

NOTE: This is not legal advice and I apologize if what I wrote is viewed as negative or if I sound like a jerk; it is not my intent. I wrote this because I do not want potential bad things to happen to nice people.

They only take pics of the outside front of letters and zero pics of packages.