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MaxE
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16 Jan 2023, 9:58 am

In the US we have different classes of service and it depends on when the neighborhood where you live was developed. So if your neighborhood was built after a certain date, usually you will have cluster boxes. The mail carrier (or whatever you prefer to call them) visits that cluster box each day, retrieves outgoing mail that was left there, and leaves the mail in each individual box "belonging" to each resident. Basically the same way mail was always delivered to apartments although instead of apartments you might have free-standing houses or some variation.

Older "suburban" neighborhoods have a mail box at the end of each driveway, and the mail carrier drives up to each one (the steering wheel is actually on the right) and takes care of each one. By tradition or whatever, each box has a red flag that's raised when outgoing mail is present. Our street was developed a bit over 30 years ago but we have that type of service because the surrounding neighborhood is older and so we're "grandfathered" in.

We occasionally interact with the person delivering the mail, and they're usually cordial, however I've not noticed that it's been consistently the same person and I would be surprised if many people learn their names.

My parents lived in a big city and they had the sort of service (exemplified by the Blondie comic strip) consisting of a letter carrier actually walking up to the front door (if the house is set back from the street) and inserting the mail into a slot in the door. That would seem most personal however I still would think it unusual for a resident to make the letter carrier's acquaintance. That would seem more likely in a small town where everybody knows everybody else and the same person might deliver to the same people for decades. Note that in Europe I've seen mail delivered the same way (even twice per day) however, that only happens if the front door is directly on the street. When there's a front yard (or whatever they'd call it there) then there's a mailbox next to it for that purpose, because it won't be possible to walk to the front door without being admitted by whoever is home.

I think there's a certain type of American movie or old TV program in which a family is depicted knowing the mailman and addressing him by name (Ozzie and Harriet?) but like a lot of what you'd see in such content, it wasn't realistic.


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Jakki
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16 Jan 2023, 10:52 am

Postal Peeps letter carriers and and clerks , are usually under immense pressure to get their assigned mail delivered.
There are even studies done by the post office about burn out rate times for various employee crafts . Carriers were said to last three years . But have seen lifers .. go 20- 30 yrs and by that time your seniority gets high enough that you can pick and choose more desireable routes .. If your fit enough and can hold together , its a nice job , As for a aspie you do not interact with most people . Except for brief periods of time during your day . And if you miss something .
Like a wave or a a interaction, Most supervisors will attribute it to the pace of work necessary to get the work out .
You get to use absolute focus in doing the job. And the day goes quickly cause you are always busy . And you can get ahead on some slow days and it almost feels like a holiday , And your developed automatic focus can take it easy. It kinda like a pattern recognition job. That you get to be trained for . But requires initial focus.

The intensity of the work load can be varying but always needs to be moving mail . hence the " GOING POSTAL"
thing can happen , At least in the US Postal system. Women are no exception , but we seem to keep our cool alittle better at times over the Male Letter carriers. You kinda get trained not to respond to people being unfriendly ,cause
your job is not public relations ,but to only get the mail out . :ninja: .But its nice to be nice . :D


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Princess Viola
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16 Jan 2023, 10:56 am

At my house down here in South Florida, our mailbox is right by our door, so our mailman has to walk up to the door to drop off the mail. But I don't even know his name, I know we usually have the same guy that we've had for some years now (I wanna say at least 10+ years?) but we're not exactly hanging outside waiting for him. Only times I've ever interacted with him is if I happen to be outside when he comes to deliver the mail (or the one time I needed the post office to pick up a package and they never came to pick it up despite them saying they'd pick it up by like 9am, so I gave it to him and explained what happened)



kraftiekortie
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16 Jan 2023, 11:02 am

I was only kidding, by the way.

I remember “going Postal” as a term from the 80s as well.



IsabellaLinton
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16 Jan 2023, 11:20 am

My postie’s name is Dave!

I just asked him when he delivered my phone case which I’ve been waiting for from Lithuania!! :jester:

For some reason the parcel had my name and post code but no address so it was almost returned to sender, but he saved it when he recognized my name.

Bless him!



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16 Jan 2023, 11:50 am

IsabellaLinton wrote:
My postie’s name is Dave!

I just asked him when he delivered my phone case which I’ve been waiting for from Lithuania!! :jester:

For some reason the parcel had my name and post code but no address so it was almost returned to sender, but he saved it when he recognized my name.

Bless him!


Lolzz,, yes and well you might bless him .. often incomplete addresses are required to be sent back to the sender or go to the dead letter office :skull: . But you get the odd situation..where the mail handler will just forward it to the Postal
code and hope as a matter of the process :| . Then Their equipment will try to match it to the closest match . Given the
postal code :nerdy: , From there it is strictly up to the letter carrier . And they may be willing to take a shot at the name and address, but it is not required , And usually because of the rate of speed of getting the mail out :ninja: . You take anything
out of the mail process that is not correctly marked :skull: . This speeds up everybody elses mail delivery :D . So being kind or at least neutral to your letter carrier can pay off when you least expect it . :D


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goldfish21
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16 Jan 2023, 5:12 pm

No one knows. Canada post doesn't deliver directly to the door in our neighbourhood nor any other that's been built in the last 20 years or so. Every couple blocks there's a CMB (community mailbox) where everyone has a little box accessible by a key, and a couple parcel boxes. If a package is too big to fit in that box then there's a slip to go to a local post office to pick up a parcel.

I don't know if they've added CMB's to older neighbourhoods or not, but they may have for labour efficiency's sake and might not deliver to any doors anymore.

But even when we did have delivery to the door, how would we know their name? Almost never even saw the person ever. Wouldn't know if it was the same one or different daily, and even if we did see them they're making a quick delivery and carrying on - not stopping to visit.

edit:

American style mailboxes at the ends of driveways exist here, too, but only really in farm/rural areas with very large properties, not in more typical residential areas at all. Older houses all have mail slots in/near the front door, or a small mailbox right outside it.


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kraftiekortie
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16 Jan 2023, 5:18 pm

I get my mail through a slit on my door.



IsabellaLinton
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16 Jan 2023, 5:51 pm

goldfish21 wrote:
No one knows. Canada post doesn't deliver directly to the door in our neighbourhood nor any other that's been built in the last 20 years or so. Every couple blocks there's a CMB (community mailbox) where everyone has a little box accessible by a key, and a couple parcel boxes. If a package is too big to fit in that box then there's a slip to go to a local post office to pick up a parcel.

I don't know if they've added CMB's to older neighbourhoods or not, but they may have for labour efficiency's sake and might not deliver to any doors anymore.

But even when we did have delivery to the door, how would we know their name? Almost never even saw the person ever. Wouldn't know if it was the same one or different daily, and even if we did see them they're making a quick delivery and carrying on - not stopping to visit.

edit:

American style mailboxes at the ends of driveways exist here, too, but only really in farm/rural areas with very large properties, not in more typical residential areas at all. Older houses all have mail slots in/near the front door, or a small mailbox right outside it.



I still get delivery to the door of my house. I have a box on the wall of my sun porch rather than a slit.

There’s an American-style box with a little flag, at the side of the road at my lake house.

I’ve had the same guy at my house for years. He rings the bell if he leaves a parcel even if I don’t need to sign, so I’m aware it’s there. I rush to the door just in case I do need to sign because otherwise he won’t leave the package and I’d need to go to the post office to retrieve it. That’s a PITA. As a result I say hi every time he rings and I thank him even by a wave if he’s left something that doesn’t need signed.

Years ago my mother was visiting and she had a meltdown about something random. He came to the door at the wrong moment and she started berating him. It was horrifying because maybe he thought she lived here, or that my name belonged to her face or attitude. It was sheer public humiliation for me to be represented like that.

He never said anything and I never had the guts to approach him about what happened. He’s always been very sweet to me even before that, so I think he understands. I finally asked his name today and it’s Dave. It was very nice of him to rescue my unaddressed parcel for me too.

At the lake I have no idea who the posties are because it’s a very long driveway (about 500m) and I can’t see the box from the house.



goldfish21
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16 Jan 2023, 5:58 pm

^lol I'm just chuckling at the generation gap of having spare houses vs. no houses.


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IsabellaLinton
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16 Jan 2023, 6:00 pm

It’s not a spare house.
lol I wish



goldfish21
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16 Jan 2023, 6:01 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
It’s not a spare house.
lol I wish

Second house?
Additional house?

More real estate than just a primary residence.. which my generation and younger struggle to have at all.


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IsabellaLinton
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16 Jan 2023, 6:06 pm

I didn’t pay for it and I don’t pay any bills or taxes. My former partner owns it and lives there full time but he put my name on the deed. When he dies I’ll get it since he has no children. I’d need to liquidate and wouldn’t be able to care for it on my own since it’s too much land. I stay there like a cottage in the meantime.



MaxE
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16 Jan 2023, 6:15 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
goldfish21 wrote:
No one knows. Canada post doesn't deliver directly to the door in our neighbourhood nor any other that's been built in the last 20 years or so. Every couple blocks there's a CMB (community mailbox) where everyone has a little box accessible by a key, and a couple parcel boxes. If a package is too big to fit in that box then there's a slip to go to a local post office to pick up a parcel.

I don't know if they've added CMB's to older neighbourhoods or not, but they may have for labour efficiency's sake and might not deliver to any doors anymore.

But even when we did have delivery to the door, how would we know their name? Almost never even saw the person ever. Wouldn't know if it was the same one or different daily, and even if we did see them they're making a quick delivery and carrying on - not stopping to visit.

edit:

American style mailboxes at the ends of driveways exist here, too, but only really in farm/rural areas with very large properties, not in more typical residential areas at all. Older houses all have mail slots in/near the front door, or a small mailbox right outside it.



I still get delivery to the door of my house. I have a box on the wall of my sun porch rather than a slit.

There’s an American-style box with a little flag, at the side of the road at my lake house.

Now that I think of it, I have a relative who lives on a lake in South Frontenac (full-time) and they have that sort of mailbox. I tend to not assume anything we have here in the US exists in Canada unless I can recall a specific instance. Although that sort of thing would seem to be unusual in Canada considering what others have said.


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IsabellaLinton
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16 Jan 2023, 6:36 pm

^ We’re in QC, but they’re common in rural and northern townships across Ontario and other provinces.



MaxE
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16 Jan 2023, 8:06 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
^ We’re in QC, but they’re common in rural and northern townships across Ontario and other provinces.

Hmm are you familiar with the Lac du Castor Blanc?


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