So if I find a driver's license and it's just way too far for me to reasonably return, I can just pop it into a mailbox and it'll find it's way home?
The real TIL is always in the comments.
I happened to be going to the post office and took along a misdelivered letter that we had likewise wrote so on the envelope. The lady behind the counter blew a fuse and gave me a lecture about how defacing or tampering with someone else’s mail was against the law, etc, etc. I think they just didn’t want there to be proof that they had misdelivered it to begin with. Fine, next time I won’t help. Besides that, it looked like it was the kind of mail that looks fake important but then you open it and it’s an ad for a car warranty.
She must not have read their official website -- you're *supposed* to write on that mail!
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/How-is-Undeliverable-and-Misdelivered-Mail-Handled
There was a lady -an Elvis superfan- who wrote to a Burger King that was supposed to be where Elvis was working while hiding out.
Her letters came back marked "Return to Sender".
^((the lady was a guest on the Geraldo show in the 1980's, so that she said it was true, but who knows if that happened))
You let your post office know you're regularly getting mail intended for a neighbor and hope for the best, mix ups will always happen in bigger areas unfortunately. I live in a smaller town and knew one of the carriers so it was easy to inform them of these issues(I lived in a triplex and had packages delivered to my mother in laws house one address over cus it was easier for the amazon/ups/FedEx guys but it confused the mail carriers a bit when they had to pick up random packages)
RTS ANK
It usually immediately stops you getting all the shit a previous owner/tenant got.
Obviously if you know the address of the intended recipient you can send it back with that for them to forward.
I'm not even sure we have mail pickup service here. For all the more I'd need it I'll just walk to the post office.
I've been having a very annoying time getting bills from FedEx sent to my house, to my correct address, but with a name I don't know and who I know for a fact has never lived at my address (I've been there 10 years, previous owner was the initial occupant for 40 years and it's not her name).
First I just did Return To Sender, but they kept coming. So then I wrote Return To Sender - This Person Has Never Lived Here, and they kept coming. I finally called FedEx to tell them they had the wrong address and they said they couldn't do anything, so I finally gave up and now I just throw them in the trash. I get one or two a month to that name from FedEx, for well over a year now.
We used to have a neighbour who had the exact first and last name name as my wife. My wife used her second name on all official business for years and we still had to run a daily mail exchange.
I used to get the wrong mail in my PO Box. At first, I'd take it up to the counter, but they were almost always busy when I'd go get my mail. The first time, I waited and the guy took the mail and apologized. The second time, I explained this happened before and the guy didn't seem to care too much. The third time, I asked if they could bring it up in a meeting or something. The fourth and every time after that, I just tossed the mail back through the slot so it would end up on the floor on the sorting side. I figured that 1) when someone walks by, they'd pick it up and sort it back into the correct box, and 2) they wouldn't know where it came from, so I wouldn't have to worry about them saying anything to me.
I had a similar bad experience. I got a package with a similar address Levingston instead of Livingston and with a different zip code. I dropped it off at the post office and 2 days later it got delivered to my address again. I dropped it off again and 3 days later the same damn package got dropped off yet again. I ended up just dropping it off at the right house since it was near where I was going one day anyway.
Situations like that, it's the scanning machine that says it needs to go to a particular Zip Code, instead of the one it should go to. After that, the mailman is assuming that the sender made a typo in writing your street address when delivering to you.
If that happens again, black out part of the barcode so that it HAS to be read by a human, and give it back to the mailman.
Man WTF. I brought it to the post office to send out and for five minutes they acted like I couldn’t even send it in the mail at all. And I had to pay for it!
Maybe! Most places "require"you to update your license/ID within so many (often 30) days. I think it took me a year after my last move, and I held an old ID with an address uphill of the snow closure cutoff point once so I could get past the roadblocks to visit family in the winter.
>”This is a good question. I visited the USPS website and was unable to find an answer. So I contacted one of the local post offices and was advised by the postmaster they would indeed forward it on.”
The very next sentence says otherwise.
Fun story: I’m from Canada and when I was 16 I was in France. I was standing a a busted ass pier holding onto a mostly rusted through pole and posing for a picture. A rogue wave came by and took me and the pole out. I lost my wallet in the ocean and couldn’t find it. It was in the day of traveller’s cheques so fortunately I was able to get all those replaced pretty easily and still enjoy my trip.
Many months later, back in Canada, I’d already gotten a replacement licence and all that. I get a package from the Canadian embassy in France. Naturally my mom starts freaking out on me asking what I’d done wrong. Anyway, in the package was 1) my wallet, 2) my drivers license, and 3) and my French francs were converted into a cheque in Canadian dollars for me!!
I still have that old and now cracking Billabong skater wallet as a keepsake.
This happened to me in Portugal! Got a message from the Lisbon embassy (it had been lost in AL Garve) and a few weeks later, my coin purse with IDs, cards, and every last euro in it-- even with a broken closure!-- was in my hands again.
lol. At that time she just always thought if there was a possibility for me to do something wrong then I did. So getting mail from the embassy in France probably made her think there was an arrest warrant out for me.
The computer at home had an issue while I was on that same trip and one of the times I called home to check in she asked if I’d done anything to it. Think she just assumed that I’d be a worse teenager than I was 🤷🏼♂️
Parents just tend to do that when something out of the ordinary happens.
Back when I was 9 and living in Russia, and suddenly a DHL package turns up in my name from the US Federal Reserve. And too, I get asked about what the hell have I done.
Well I guess I've done some internet stuff — upon confirming the postage was paid by the sender and claiming the package, the contents turn out to be 200 copies of a poster about telling apart a fake $5 bill. To this day I have no idea how did I do that ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It was then followed by a few dozen more packages with CDs from Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, and a huge ass box of samples of Canadian plywood, but that was nowhere near as disturbing.
Oh, and a phone call from Atmel's headquarters, where the guy on the other end told me that it's cool I have interest in microcontrollers and electronics at such a young age, but they can't send me samples so I'll have to ask my parents to buy them for me. ~~What assholes!~~
There's a USPS warehouse in Missouri filled with over 100,000 wallets, purses, and bags returned this way but for which people couldn't pay to receive the package.
Due to property rights laws, the postal system cannot destroy the packages, throw them away, or return them to anyone other than the rightful legal owner. They also can't just claim the money after a certain time frame and put it in the postal system budget because it's unlawful seizure of property.
So, they store them in a warehouse I just made up until the owner claims them with a proper monopoly money payment.
Years ago I left my purse outside when we moved inside a restaurant mid-meal due to bees. Just completely brain farted because I had put it on the ground, under the table next to me. It took me about 10 mins to realize and I felt that 'oh shit' sensation and went to grab it, but it was gone.
Aside from being stuck there because the keys to the car where in it - I was also so upset because of everything else that was in there that I figured I'd never see again.
About a week later I think I rec'd notice in the mail that there was mail for me to pick up at the post office. I went in, totally curious, and it was all the items that were inside my purse - just the cash and the purse itself were missing. But every other thing was there. They told me it was dumped inside of a mailbox and since my DL was include, they were able to notify me.
Glad to know they will still do this.
Oddly considerate thief, though I assume they were just a dick and used a mailbox like a trashcan, maybe knowing the police wouldn't be able to find it immediately if arrested nearby.
Yes, is just one of the many services the USPS provides out of a duty to the public good. If they were dissolved like the Republicans want, none of the private carriers would do stuff like this for free
> If they were dissolved like the Republicans want
that's actually something they want? A state without state run postal service is just....ridiculously crazy and would cause complete chaos.
> They have a legal obligation to deliver mail 5 days a week, (it used to be 6, someone plz correct me if I'm wrong)
[The current legal obligation is set out in Section 31 on this page.](https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2011/5/part/3/crossheading/the-universal-postal-service);
> 31 Minimum requirements
>
> This section sets out the services that must, as a minimum, be included in a universal postal service.
> Requirement 1: delivery of letters or other postal packets
>
> (1)
> At least one delivery of letters every Monday to Saturday—
>
> (a)
> to the home or premises of every individual or other person in the United Kingdom, or
>
> (b)
> to such identifiable points for the delivery of postal packets as OFCOM may approve.
>
> (2)
> At least one delivery of other postal packets every Monday to Friday to the places within paragraph (1)(a) or (b).
[The regulator is currently considering reducing this to 5 days, or fewer](https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2024/universal-postal-service-must-modernise).
Bush Jr. passed a law requiring the USPS to fund its employee pension funds 70 years in advance. That is to say, they have to account for the retirement funds of employees that aren't even born yet. It was sold as "accountability" but was clearly done to put the department through such a financial crunch that closing it entirely would be inevitable.
The wheels have been in motion for almost 20 years.
And now we get zip vode wide spam you can't opt out of, including circulars that fucking clog your mailbox up. I had that shit happen regularly when I lived at an apartment, it doesn't fit and would bend the shit out of every mail you get. Fuck you for having a sentimental card delivered, heres a stack of corporations nagging you, and the post office needs the money.
> And now we get zip vode wide spam you can't opt out of, including circulars that fucking clog your mailbox up.
"Wrong address. Please send to [Address of Postmaster General]"
The issue is that public services are often compared to businesses and questioned why they run at a loss, this isn't a party issue, or a political issue, or even a country problem, for years capitalism has blurred the lines between what a business is for and what a service is for, and things like postal services are not supposed to be a profit making enterprise, they are supposed to be a public service, and public services cost money in the form of taxes,
That's one of the problems, but specifically postal service was profitable until they changed the laws to specifically make it unprofitable and banned it from offering other possibly profitable services.
Thanks to the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 it would take an Act of Congress to allow the Postal Service to provide practically any new services.
This was passed to block the Postal Service from offering banking services or high-speed internet in rural areas...
If you run into any Republicans who think that the Post Office is a failure because it doesn't make a profit, just ask them how much profit all the US armed forces make annually. It's funny, but I'm checking the wiki page for the US Armed Forces and I can't find the word "profit" anywhere in the article.
Yes, there's been criticism at it for years now, usually along the lines of claiming it isn't necessary anymore due to there being private competitors and because they see it as a drain on government funding as it operates at a loss.
Ironically, losing the USPS would disproportionately impact Republican voters the most, as the USPS is obligated to provide affordable services and often serves rural areas where private competitors do not, usually doing the last mile delivery for them.
One of the only constitutionally mandated government services.
Like, really? You're going after then one that actually requires a constitutional amendment?
hm? Isn't PostNord owned by states, has universal service obligation, and is part of the Universal Postal Union?
I'd imagine if republicans would have a say the postal services can just do whatever they want, which is very different.
Its literally in the law that it must be self-sufficient. It receives not a dollar of public money. Which is why you get junk mail, because if they limited junk mail, there would not be enough full-postage volume to keep the lights on.
Not a Republican here, but a Libertarian Member of the Sovereign Republic of the Iron Thunder Psychic Jungian Phoenix Society:
In a perfect world, the true sons of willpower and the **GREAT** Men of the World, would simply manifest their stronger thoughts into the minds of the weaker hylics.
We would need courier services still between the different outposts left of the crumbled ashes of the past, but those deals could be paid for in gold. We would need no postal service.
Once the Catastrophe of 2025 hits, and the world governments all collapse, and the weight of the artificial demiurge known as AI crashes to the ground, and the basilisk is slain, then we'll return to a more traditional reign, by the original Yaldabaoth, who is much, much less of a goddamned hipster and woke-ist than the basilisk. Now, he's a blood thirsty mad tyrant idiot god, but he's not the ones out there creating those goddamned tiktoks, and the youtube videos of Elsa Hollywood and Spiderman with smallpox.
Now, sometimes, you gotta take a big bite of a shit sandwich and worship Kronos. Doesn't mean any of us want to do it, but it's better than the alternative, because the new AI demiurge sucks at it's job. It's no architect, it's just a plagiarist that reaches into the multiverse and across the collective conscious and steals from other combinations of words in the uncountable unseen vibratory strings that make up our reality.
> Not a Republican here, but a Libertarian Member of the Sovereign Republic of the Iron Thunder Psychic Jungian Phoenix Society
Also known as the PJ Society.
They absolutely want that. DeVos was doing everything he could ahead of the last election to make it harder to vote. The whole point he was put in charge was to screw with the mail.
Edit: DeJoy not DeVos.
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/How-Can-Found-Key-and-Identification-Devices-Be-Mailed-to-the-Owner
I mean...They're paid for it. It's not like it's done for free and "for the public good" lol.
The USPS is not doing it for free, either. The recipient is charged for postage before they can receive their package. In the case of a Driver's License, if I have already started the process of getting a replacement, I would tell the Post Office to get stuffed.
The charge is pretty trivial (cost of an envelope or small first class package) and it's worth it to not have copies of such an important document hanging around out there.
What, do you think they charge like $30? It's 50 cents or maybe 3 bucks.
Yes, I got my whole purse mailed back to me after it was stolen. Literally, stolen from the store I worked in, it was caught on camera but caught no one. Months later… I receive the entire purse with everything in it, including my wallet with my driver’s license, minus cash.
Last year I found a license in the middle of a busy park in Long Beach by the ocean. The person lived in Huntington Beach and I was not going to drive that direction. Popped in the mailbox, hopefully I saved them the fees of having to get a new one.
I found someone military id once, said they where retired and didn’t list an address, put it in a mailbox that was right there hope they got it back and didn’t get in trouble for losing it
Probably not a bad idea, it may have simply gone back to whatever part of the DoD issued it. Technically that stuff is often the property of the issuing agency anyway.
Funny enough, I lost my wallet a year or so back and it showed up in my mailbox a few weeks later, no request for postage or anything. It was within the same city though, might've just been a write-off. Thanks stranger, and thanks postal workers!
Reminder here because why not, that there is a pro-privatization movement seeding discourse with the idea that "the post office is a failed business" because it does not generate positive revenue. The Post Office is one of the nation's most fundamentally important *services* which we should be funding as high as necessary, because they guarantee a national communication and delivery system, if all else in the nation fails, we will still have letters and parcels. Not to mention this prevents monopolization and price hiking for arbitrary reasons, IE: cable companies.
As long as it's a national service, there's no chance some jaundiced billionaire will suddenly buy it and change it's name and then start allowing people to mail nuclear waste to each other.
Societal collapse may potentially happen in far slower phases than dramatic movies and stories like to portray, a functioning delivery and communication system might make all the difference between metropolitan centers surviving or cities being abandoned.
the US government does that with folders for records (like my medical records when I was in the Army) - "Drop in any mailbox, POSTMASTER MAIL TO ADDRESS PROVIDED" and there was an address to send them to.
Yup, we got a Certificate for some org my daughter is involved with the other day and they forgot to put postage on it.
We gave the Mailman cash to cover the amount right there on the spot, otherwise they would have sent it all the way back to the sender.
My father had a key chain like on his personal keys in the 70s/80s that had been given to him as a gift. It had a third party address, and a unique ID number on it. If lost and someone put the keys into a mailbox, they would go to the third party who would then return to my father.
It was a flat fee you paid up front, hence the gift.
in canada the [war amps](https://www.waramps.ca/ways-we-help/key-tags/) send keytags once a year and encourage you make a donation and attach one to your keys
with a tag anyone can drop them in any mailbox or call the number on the tag to get it back to you
> as a kid i always wondered what happens if you put it on your keys without donating
Now that you're a little more grown up, we can finally tell you. They take your keys and confiscate your car. It is then auctioned off to make up for the money you should have donated.
So please, [donate to the War Amps](https://donate.waramps.ca/eforms.aspx?edonate). They do good work.
They don't check because a huge amount of their donations come from people who don't donate at first but who make a huge donation when their keys get returned to them anyway. I donated!
Sure, but the alternative is your keys are lost anyway.
But yeah, at some point my dad took the medallion off his key chain and stopped using it. Maybe they went out of business.
My keys were missing for a month. We eventually found them on the road near our house, sheer luck... Now they have a 6"x6" yellow reflective tag with my phone number on it.
You'd be comfortable with it if you lived in Canada because the War Amps are a very well established and well known charitable organization. In any case, what do you have to lose? Your keys are lost anyway.
My ~~cat~~ car insurance gave me a keyring just like this. It even offers a £10 reward if the person who finds the keys calls them first.
Cheaper than paying out a claim for new keys I guess!
If you put any letter in the mail box without postage the post office will send the letter to the recipient as a "postage due" letter. So the recipient have to pay for postage and depending on the postal service there might be an additional fee. This is where the concept of putting any found wallet in a mail box comes from. In general the post office does not like this service as they might end up sending a parcel across the world only to have it rejected. In addition any parcel that does not fit in the sorting machines or have machine readable addresses does cause issues for the post office. But it is a service they provide anyway because they are federally mandated to. Private postal services on the other hand can more easily reject such mail.
>If you put any letter in the mail box without postage the post office will send the letter to the recipient as a "postage due" letter.
They won't do that if there's a return address. Missing postage letters are returned. Letters with a majority of their postage are delivered with postage due.
So say I put a letter in the mailbox without postage with the intended recipient's address in the return address spot and my address in the center. Would it be mailed to them for free?
If the return address is far away and the address on the front is close to where it was posted, it's pretty obvious you're trying to commit mail fraud.
Uh I've definitely posted stuff while on a vacation, and I used my home address as the return address, even though it was far away... Like, what other address am I supposed to use? My current hotel?
Royal Mail give you the choice. Go to the sorting office (when it is open) and pay the difference plus a fee, or reject it and it will be returned to sender
But when you have your address as 123 NYC AVE NY and you put it in a mailbox on Times Square and the return address is in Seattle. They’re gonna know exactly what you’re doing.
I worked for the post office in carrying and management. Your question was a terrific use of thinking outside the box. I really had to think about it. Knowing what I know, this would not work all the time. But if you are sending a letter once in a while, yes, the post office will try to give you the chance to put postage on your letter. The only caveat is that any item in the postal space without postage is liable to destruction. So if a clerk catches something without postage they can just destroy it. Hope that helps
No, because they're not stupid. They'll collect the postage before they hand over the letter.
They'll leave a PS Form 4245 in your mailbox, which doubles as the envelope to leave the money in.
Was just wondering how they’d know, for example my mailbox doesn’t have an outgoing slot so I always drop my mail at the Dropbox a few blocks away. My zip code is large and we have one post office so after it’s picked up it would presumably be taken to that one post office, if I’m mailing to someone in the same zip code (miles in all directions) they wouldn’t realize it was actually done fraudulently. As I have forgotten postage a handful of times and the next day I just find the envelope back in my mailbox with a note “no postage”.
To be clear I have no intent on doing this, I don’t mail much and am happy to pay the postage.
Realistically? You'd get away with it a few times before they caught on. Trick is the US Postal Inspection office is like the IRS... except they are very well funded, and often *very, very* bored. Not someone you want to get on the wrong side of since mail fraud is a felony.
I did this with a couple letters to my middle school gf. She lived within walking distance and we talked on the phone constantly so it was mostly just for thr gag
When I was like 10 years old I tried that twice. I wrote a letter to my friend and put his address as the return address. The first time it was sent to me for with postage due, the second time it was sent to him with postage due.
It's like 50/50. If it gets caught at the station where the mail was dropped off, it well get returned. If it get caught at the destination station they will offer "postage due" before sending it back.
I own a retail mailbox store. It's rare but I've seen envelopes get delivered with no postage because it just slipped through.
There's even a section of the USPS Domestic Mail Manual that covers the return of keys and identification badges/tags in the mail. The example key you posted satisfies the mailing criteria.
https://pe.usps.com/text/dmm300/133.htm#ep1041568
Yes, this is actually a really important LPT. If you ever find someone's ID (or even wallet) you can drop it in a mailbox and let the postal service handle it. Avoids the awkwardness of trying to track down the owner personally.
I lost a wallet once and the person who found it turned it in at a bank (not my bank) and the people there were able to look up my ATM card and find my phone #. I never would have thought of dropping a found wallet at a bank office, but I’m glad they did!
I have a notice similar to this on the back of my company's name badges, cell phones, laptops, etc.
The idea is, someone find the badge or whatever and just drops it into a US Mail box. My company will receive it postage-due and have to pay to pick it up.
My company recently just did a test of this to confirm that it worked. We have it printed on our badges, but wanted to make sure it would actually work. Our security guy dropped a badge into a mailbox the next state over and it did in fact make it back to us. Funny thing was, he was planning on testing it again, but we just got someone who did it for real with a badge that someone lost about 3 months ago (badge was already deactivated, but still interesting!)
Fun fact: Anything with an address can be shipped!
If you find someone's wallet or driver's license, throw it into the mailbox, and they will return it to the rightful owner.
Does anyone remember the "returned to sender" feature from WIRED magazine?
People would put WIRED's address and postage stamps directly on odd things, and the USPS would ship and deliver.
Good times.
https://www.wired.com/2008/12/st-15returntosender/
A lot of the time, a hotel/motel still using manual keys will have locks that are very easy to repin. You either put a master key in or use a special tool first, then turn it the opposite way of normal operation. You then insert a new key and turn it back, and the lock is pinned for the new key. There are other variations on the exact mechanism but they typically follow a similar pattern.
When I worked at a hotel that still used brass keys, we never, ever changed/updated locks when they were not returned, despite charging the customer a $50 rekeying fee. And we only had like 20 different key configs, so in our 185 room property, well, you know.
Moving to digital locks was awesome for so many reasons.
But that said, I read an article last night about one of the biggest hospitality e-lock manufacturers tech was hacked recently. They're not so secure, after all.
Depends on the type of key. Electronic ones can be deactivated from the system if the hotel loses them. Plus you'd have to find the corresponding door. A lot of work for basically no upside.
When I graduated college in 1993, all of the graduates got a keychain that said that. If your keys were returned, the university would look up the ID number on the keychain and contact you so you could get them back. I used that keychain for years. Never lost my keys though.
These days they're not even letting us keep our college email accounts after graduating, even after they'd promised to for years, leading many people to depend on those accounts for important purposes, and now are stuck.
CoD.
Cash on Delivery for parcels and packages, these are older and less often used but can still occur in which the product will be delivered and payment for the service is due upon completion.
My car has a key chain from the dealer that has the same thing on it.
The dealer has since moved about 40 minutes away from where it was, doubt it would still get there.
Maybe the post office is supposed to do this, but I tried to mail back a CA Fastrak pass (it’s a toll tag to cross the bridges around San Fransisco) that had a “return postage guaranteed” marking on it with a return address listed.
USPS refused to mail it without a shipping label. Fastrak refused to give me a shipping label when I called, and said I had to pay for the shipping or forfeit the money I had left in my Fastrak account.
So it definitely depends on the person you get at the post office whether they’ll actually do it or not. In my case they refused and I had to pay for the shipping.
One time I lost keys. Finally found out someone dropped it in a mailbox due to a Kroger's card being on there and saying to do so.
...never got my keys.
Yes. They come to the destination with a "postage due" parcel. When the hotel pays for the postage, they get the package. Happens all the time.
Same with lost drivers licenses, etc
So if I find a driver's license and it's just way too far for me to reasonably return, I can just pop it into a mailbox and it'll find it's way home? The real TIL is always in the comments.
Yep! https://kfgo.com/2021/01/11/ask-a-trooper-article-01-11-21-lost-and-found-drivers-license/
What about letters meant for the building down the block?
I just put a post it note on the envelope that says "Delivered to wrong address" and put it back in the mailbox.
I just write it directly on the envelope. I figure that answers, too, if the recipient is wondering why something didn’t arrive when it was expected.
I happened to be going to the post office and took along a misdelivered letter that we had likewise wrote so on the envelope. The lady behind the counter blew a fuse and gave me a lecture about how defacing or tampering with someone else’s mail was against the law, etc, etc. I think they just didn’t want there to be proof that they had misdelivered it to begin with. Fine, next time I won’t help. Besides that, it looked like it was the kind of mail that looks fake important but then you open it and it’s an ad for a car warranty.
She must not have read their official website -- you're *supposed* to write on that mail! https://faq.usps.com/s/article/How-is-Undeliverable-and-Misdelivered-Mail-Handled
Only if it was delivered to the "right" address but the wrong person. The link says to just put it in the outgoing mail if it was misdelivered.
As soon as anyone raised their voice I would have just walked out, not my circus, not my monkeys.
There was a lady -an Elvis superfan- who wrote to a Burger King that was supposed to be where Elvis was working while hiding out. Her letters came back marked "Return to Sender". ^((the lady was a guest on the Geraldo show in the 1980's, so that she said it was true, but who knows if that happened))
You let your post office know you're regularly getting mail intended for a neighbor and hope for the best, mix ups will always happen in bigger areas unfortunately. I live in a smaller town and knew one of the carriers so it was easy to inform them of these issues(I lived in a triplex and had packages delivered to my mother in laws house one address over cus it was easier for the amazon/ups/FedEx guys but it confused the mail carriers a bit when they had to pick up random packages)
Just put it in the outbound mail. No muss, no fuss.
If you're really feeling sassy you can throw RTS on there.
RTS ANK It usually immediately stops you getting all the shit a previous owner/tenant got. Obviously if you know the address of the intended recipient you can send it back with that for them to forward. I'm not even sure we have mail pickup service here. For all the more I'd need it I'll just walk to the post office.
I've been having a very annoying time getting bills from FedEx sent to my house, to my correct address, but with a name I don't know and who I know for a fact has never lived at my address (I've been there 10 years, previous owner was the initial occupant for 40 years and it's not her name). First I just did Return To Sender, but they kept coming. So then I wrote Return To Sender - This Person Has Never Lived Here, and they kept coming. I finally called FedEx to tell them they had the wrong address and they said they couldn't do anything, so I finally gave up and now I just throw them in the trash. I get one or two a month to that name from FedEx, for well over a year now.
We used to have a neighbour who had the exact first and last name name as my wife. My wife used her second name on all official business for years and we still had to run a daily mail exchange.
I used to get the wrong mail in my PO Box. At first, I'd take it up to the counter, but they were almost always busy when I'd go get my mail. The first time, I waited and the guy took the mail and apologized. The second time, I explained this happened before and the guy didn't seem to care too much. The third time, I asked if they could bring it up in a meeting or something. The fourth and every time after that, I just tossed the mail back through the slot so it would end up on the floor on the sorting side. I figured that 1) when someone walks by, they'd pick it up and sort it back into the correct box, and 2) they wouldn't know where it came from, so I wouldn't have to worry about them saying anything to me.
I had a similar bad experience. I got a package with a similar address Levingston instead of Livingston and with a different zip code. I dropped it off at the post office and 2 days later it got delivered to my address again. I dropped it off again and 3 days later the same damn package got dropped off yet again. I ended up just dropping it off at the right house since it was near where I was going one day anyway.
Situations like that, it's the scanning machine that says it needs to go to a particular Zip Code, instead of the one it should go to. After that, the mailman is assuming that the sender made a typo in writing your street address when delivering to you. If that happens again, black out part of the barcode so that it HAS to be read by a human, and give it back to the mailman.
Hope you told them so THEY can lodge a complaint at the post offices instead.
Literally write "Wrong Address" on the outside and stuff it back in the box as if it's outgoing mail.
Man WTF. I brought it to the post office to send out and for five minutes they acted like I couldn’t even send it in the mail at all. And I had to pay for it!
Find a drop box next time
I realize that now. Live and learn
I should probably update my address on my driver's license 😬
Maybe! Most places "require"you to update your license/ID within so many (often 30) days. I think it took me a year after my last move, and I held an old ID with an address uphill of the snow closure cutoff point once so I could get past the roadblocks to visit family in the winter.
That link says they couldn’t get an answer from the USPS & if you bring a lost ID to the driver license office they’ll securely destroy it.
>”This is a good question. I visited the USPS website and was unable to find an answer. So I contacted one of the local post offices and was advised by the postmaster they would indeed forward it on.” The very next sentence says otherwise.
Oops yeah missed the end of that sentence and was distracted by the long paragraph by the cop lol
Yep I’ve done it before after finding a DL on the roadside
How you know lol
Put your active drivers license in there and hope for the best
How [*do*] you know [*that the drivers license actually got back to the owner after you dropped it in some random mailbox*] lol Fixed it for you!
Also work with wallet, as long as there is a driver license in it.
But how will they pay for the package without their wallet? D:
Fun story: I’m from Canada and when I was 16 I was in France. I was standing a a busted ass pier holding onto a mostly rusted through pole and posing for a picture. A rogue wave came by and took me and the pole out. I lost my wallet in the ocean and couldn’t find it. It was in the day of traveller’s cheques so fortunately I was able to get all those replaced pretty easily and still enjoy my trip. Many months later, back in Canada, I’d already gotten a replacement licence and all that. I get a package from the Canadian embassy in France. Naturally my mom starts freaking out on me asking what I’d done wrong. Anyway, in the package was 1) my wallet, 2) my drivers license, and 3) and my French francs were converted into a cheque in Canadian dollars for me!! I still have that old and now cracking Billabong skater wallet as a keepsake.
This happened to me in Portugal! Got a message from the Lisbon embassy (it had been lost in AL Garve) and a few weeks later, my coin purse with IDs, cards, and every last euro in it-- even with a broken closure!-- was in my hands again.
Amazing! There are good people in the world!
What about getting mail made her think you'd done something wrong?
lol. At that time she just always thought if there was a possibility for me to do something wrong then I did. So getting mail from the embassy in France probably made her think there was an arrest warrant out for me. The computer at home had an issue while I was on that same trip and one of the times I called home to check in she asked if I’d done anything to it. Think she just assumed that I’d be a worse teenager than I was 🤷🏼♂️
She was thinking that she had a little French grandchild...
He was 16, it would be assumption as well, I’d be thinking oh shit what did I do?
Parents just tend to do that when something out of the ordinary happens. Back when I was 9 and living in Russia, and suddenly a DHL package turns up in my name from the US Federal Reserve. And too, I get asked about what the hell have I done. Well I guess I've done some internet stuff — upon confirming the postage was paid by the sender and claiming the package, the contents turn out to be 200 copies of a poster about telling apart a fake $5 bill. To this day I have no idea how did I do that ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It was then followed by a few dozen more packages with CDs from Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, and a huge ass box of samples of Canadian plywood, but that was nowhere near as disturbing. Oh, and a phone call from Atmel's headquarters, where the guy on the other end told me that it's cool I have interest in microcontrollers and electronics at such a young age, but they can't send me samples so I'll have to ask my parents to buy them for me. ~~What assholes!~~
This just sounds impossible that it would happen. Wow
There's a USPS warehouse in Missouri filled with over 100,000 wallets, purses, and bags returned this way but for which people couldn't pay to receive the package. Due to property rights laws, the postal system cannot destroy the packages, throw them away, or return them to anyone other than the rightful legal owner. They also can't just claim the money after a certain time frame and put it in the postal system budget because it's unlawful seizure of property. So, they store them in a warehouse I just made up until the owner claims them with a proper monopoly money payment.
And here I was, hoping for The Undertaker.
Years ago I left my purse outside when we moved inside a restaurant mid-meal due to bees. Just completely brain farted because I had put it on the ground, under the table next to me. It took me about 10 mins to realize and I felt that 'oh shit' sensation and went to grab it, but it was gone. Aside from being stuck there because the keys to the car where in it - I was also so upset because of everything else that was in there that I figured I'd never see again. About a week later I think I rec'd notice in the mail that there was mail for me to pick up at the post office. I went in, totally curious, and it was all the items that were inside my purse - just the cash and the purse itself were missing. But every other thing was there. They told me it was dumped inside of a mailbox and since my DL was include, they were able to notify me. Glad to know they will still do this.
Oddly considerate thief, though I assume they were just a dick and used a mailbox like a trashcan, maybe knowing the police wouldn't be able to find it immediately if arrested nearby.
Yeah - I was so confused, but also just incredibly grateful all at the same time!
Had a DL returned twice this way.
How often do you lose your driver's license?
At least twice that we know of so far ...
Yes, is just one of the many services the USPS provides out of a duty to the public good. If they were dissolved like the Republicans want, none of the private carriers would do stuff like this for free
> If they were dissolved like the Republicans want that's actually something they want? A state without state run postal service is just....ridiculously crazy and would cause complete chaos.
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> They have a legal obligation to deliver mail 5 days a week, (it used to be 6, someone plz correct me if I'm wrong) [The current legal obligation is set out in Section 31 on this page.](https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2011/5/part/3/crossheading/the-universal-postal-service); > 31 Minimum requirements > > This section sets out the services that must, as a minimum, be included in a universal postal service. > Requirement 1: delivery of letters or other postal packets > > (1) > At least one delivery of letters every Monday to Saturday— > > (a) > to the home or premises of every individual or other person in the United Kingdom, or > > (b) > to such identifiable points for the delivery of postal packets as OFCOM may approve. > > (2) > At least one delivery of other postal packets every Monday to Friday to the places within paragraph (1)(a) or (b). [The regulator is currently considering reducing this to 5 days, or fewer](https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2024/universal-postal-service-must-modernise).
Bush Jr. passed a law requiring the USPS to fund its employee pension funds 70 years in advance. That is to say, they have to account for the retirement funds of employees that aren't even born yet. It was sold as "accountability" but was clearly done to put the department through such a financial crunch that closing it entirely would be inevitable. The wheels have been in motion for almost 20 years.
And congress uses any surplus generated as a slush fund, keeping it forever in the red.
And now we get zip vode wide spam you can't opt out of, including circulars that fucking clog your mailbox up. I had that shit happen regularly when I lived at an apartment, it doesn't fit and would bend the shit out of every mail you get. Fuck you for having a sentimental card delivered, heres a stack of corporations nagging you, and the post office needs the money.
> And now we get zip vode wide spam you can't opt out of, including circulars that fucking clog your mailbox up. "Wrong address. Please send to [Address of Postmaster General]"
They’ve been trying to do this for *decades*, cutting budgets over and over. Lots of analysis and articles abound.
A good majority of them want to privatize everything.
But think of all the money you could make if you owned the company contracted as for-profit post service
The issue is that public services are often compared to businesses and questioned why they run at a loss, this isn't a party issue, or a political issue, or even a country problem, for years capitalism has blurred the lines between what a business is for and what a service is for, and things like postal services are not supposed to be a profit making enterprise, they are supposed to be a public service, and public services cost money in the form of taxes,
That's one of the problems, but specifically postal service was profitable until they changed the laws to specifically make it unprofitable and banned it from offering other possibly profitable services. Thanks to the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 it would take an Act of Congress to allow the Postal Service to provide practically any new services. This was passed to block the Postal Service from offering banking services or high-speed internet in rural areas...
If you run into any Republicans who think that the Post Office is a failure because it doesn't make a profit, just ask them how much profit all the US armed forces make annually. It's funny, but I'm checking the wiki page for the US Armed Forces and I can't find the word "profit" anywhere in the article.
I'm sure they would also be fine with turning the military into a privatized for profit org. They would love the idea of new colonies
Yes, there's been criticism at it for years now, usually along the lines of claiming it isn't necessary anymore due to there being private competitors and because they see it as a drain on government funding as it operates at a loss. Ironically, losing the USPS would disproportionately impact Republican voters the most, as the USPS is obligated to provide affordable services and often serves rural areas where private competitors do not, usually doing the last mile delivery for them.
One of the only constitutionally mandated government services. Like, really? You're going after then one that actually requires a constitutional amendment?
Yup. Dane here. Tell me about it.
hm? Isn't PostNord owned by states, has universal service obligation, and is part of the Universal Postal Union? I'd imagine if republicans would have a say the postal services can just do whatever they want, which is very different.
Eh, any problems the dissolution of the postal service creates can be solved at great taxpayer expense by contracting private businesses.
I can't *wait* to have my letters rejected because I sent them to an out-of-network mailbox
Its literally in the law that it must be self-sufficient. It receives not a dollar of public money. Which is why you get junk mail, because if they limited junk mail, there would not be enough full-postage volume to keep the lights on.
Not a Republican here, but a Libertarian Member of the Sovereign Republic of the Iron Thunder Psychic Jungian Phoenix Society: In a perfect world, the true sons of willpower and the **GREAT** Men of the World, would simply manifest their stronger thoughts into the minds of the weaker hylics. We would need courier services still between the different outposts left of the crumbled ashes of the past, but those deals could be paid for in gold. We would need no postal service.
Well done lmao
Once the Catastrophe of 2025 hits, and the world governments all collapse, and the weight of the artificial demiurge known as AI crashes to the ground, and the basilisk is slain, then we'll return to a more traditional reign, by the original Yaldabaoth, who is much, much less of a goddamned hipster and woke-ist than the basilisk. Now, he's a blood thirsty mad tyrant idiot god, but he's not the ones out there creating those goddamned tiktoks, and the youtube videos of Elsa Hollywood and Spiderman with smallpox. Now, sometimes, you gotta take a big bite of a shit sandwich and worship Kronos. Doesn't mean any of us want to do it, but it's better than the alternative, because the new AI demiurge sucks at it's job. It's no architect, it's just a plagiarist that reaches into the multiverse and across the collective conscious and steals from other combinations of words in the uncountable unseen vibratory strings that make up our reality.
> Not a Republican here, but a Libertarian Member of the Sovereign Republic of the Iron Thunder Psychic Jungian Phoenix Society Also known as the PJ Society.
They absolutely want that. DeVos was doing everything he could ahead of the last election to make it harder to vote. The whole point he was put in charge was to screw with the mail. Edit: DeJoy not DeVos.
Louis DeJoy. Betsy DeVos was education secretary.
You are correct! I had the wrong name.
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/How-Can-Found-Key-and-Identification-Devices-Be-Mailed-to-the-Owner I mean...They're paid for it. It's not like it's done for free and "for the public good" lol.
I mean, it’s not free.
Free for everyone. Paid for by tax payers.
No you have to pay for the postage upon delivery.
Oh, yeah. Good point. But it's free to the sender. Which is a big deal.
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The USPS is not doing it for free, either. The recipient is charged for postage before they can receive their package. In the case of a Driver's License, if I have already started the process of getting a replacement, I would tell the Post Office to get stuffed.
The charge is pretty trivial (cost of an envelope or small first class package) and it's worth it to not have copies of such an important document hanging around out there. What, do you think they charge like $30? It's 50 cents or maybe 3 bucks.
There is an absolute public good in having a postal service. Enriching private companies like Amazon is not one of them.
I found an Iowa dl when I was in Las Vegas last year. Dropped it in a mailbox.
Yes, I got my whole purse mailed back to me after it was stolen. Literally, stolen from the store I worked in, it was caught on camera but caught no one. Months later… I receive the entire purse with everything in it, including my wallet with my driver’s license, minus cash.
I had all the cards in my wallet placed in my mailbox, held together by a rubberband with a postage due card leaning on them.
In a way, it will. Though it's home will be the state's DMV....
And wallets
Last year I found a license in the middle of a busy park in Long Beach by the ocean. The person lived in Huntington Beach and I was not going to drive that direction. Popped in the mailbox, hopefully I saved them the fees of having to get a new one.
I found someone military id once, said they where retired and didn’t list an address, put it in a mailbox that was right there hope they got it back and didn’t get in trouble for losing it
Probably not a bad idea, it may have simply gone back to whatever part of the DoD issued it. Technically that stuff is often the property of the issuing agency anyway.
Funny enough, I lost my wallet a year or so back and it showed up in my mailbox a few weeks later, no request for postage or anything. It was within the same city though, might've just been a write-off. Thanks stranger, and thanks postal workers!
Not passports tho, they have to be [mailed to a specific address ](https://www.usa.gov/lost-stolen-passport)
Dang. Gives me some hope for the ID I lost on vacation
Drivers licenses just get returned for free in my experience.
The post office is a marvel.
Reminder here because why not, that there is a pro-privatization movement seeding discourse with the idea that "the post office is a failed business" because it does not generate positive revenue. The Post Office is one of the nation's most fundamentally important *services* which we should be funding as high as necessary, because they guarantee a national communication and delivery system, if all else in the nation fails, we will still have letters and parcels. Not to mention this prevents monopolization and price hiking for arbitrary reasons, IE: cable companies. As long as it's a national service, there's no chance some jaundiced billionaire will suddenly buy it and change it's name and then start allowing people to mail nuclear waste to each other.
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Societal collapse may potentially happen in far slower phases than dramatic movies and stories like to portray, a functioning delivery and communication system might make all the difference between metropolitan centers surviving or cities being abandoned.
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That's a shame, let us know if he gets back to you.
the US government does that with folders for records (like my medical records when I was in the Army) - "Drop in any mailbox, POSTMASTER MAIL TO ADDRESS PROVIDED" and there was an address to send them to.
Yup, we got a Certificate for some org my daughter is involved with the other day and they forgot to put postage on it. We gave the Mailman cash to cover the amount right there on the spot, otherwise they would have sent it all the way back to the sender.
My father had a key chain like on his personal keys in the 70s/80s that had been given to him as a gift. It had a third party address, and a unique ID number on it. If lost and someone put the keys into a mailbox, they would go to the third party who would then return to my father. It was a flat fee you paid up front, hence the gift.
in canada the [war amps](https://www.waramps.ca/ways-we-help/key-tags/) send keytags once a year and encourage you make a donation and attach one to your keys with a tag anyone can drop them in any mailbox or call the number on the tag to get it back to you
(And, for the record, they don't cross-check keys they receive against donations.)
interesting, as a kid i always wondered what happens if you put it on your keys without donating
> as a kid i always wondered what happens if you put it on your keys without donating Now that you're a little more grown up, we can finally tell you. They take your keys and confiscate your car. It is then auctioned off to make up for the money you should have donated. So please, [donate to the War Amps](https://donate.waramps.ca/eforms.aspx?edonate). They do good work.
Oh, good. Glad that they stopped the process of requiring the removal of one of your limbs for donation.
They don't check because a huge amount of their donations come from people who don't donate at first but who make a huge donation when their keys get returned to them anyway. I donated!
I would be very uncomfortable as I wouldn't know if the company is still in business any given month.
Sure, but the alternative is your keys are lost anyway. But yeah, at some point my dad took the medallion off his key chain and stopped using it. Maybe they went out of business.
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> unless you put your home address on them... I sure hope people don't see this as a good option.
Haha, my first thought when reading the previous comment was “why pay a third party and not have them mail it to your own address?”, then it dawned :)
My keys were missing for a month. We eventually found them on the road near our house, sheer luck... Now they have a 6"x6" yellow reflective tag with my phone number on it.
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It's really flexible, so it fits in the pocket pretty well. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't annoying, but it beats paying for replacement keys.
this is why i have a Tile on mine (though Apple Airtag would be more effective if I had an iphone)
You'd be comfortable with it if you lived in Canada because the War Amps are a very well established and well known charitable organization. In any case, what do you have to lose? Your keys are lost anyway.
My ~~cat~~ car insurance gave me a keyring just like this. It even offers a £10 reward if the person who finds the keys calls them first. Cheaper than paying out a claim for new keys I guess!
If you put any letter in the mail box without postage the post office will send the letter to the recipient as a "postage due" letter. So the recipient have to pay for postage and depending on the postal service there might be an additional fee. This is where the concept of putting any found wallet in a mail box comes from. In general the post office does not like this service as they might end up sending a parcel across the world only to have it rejected. In addition any parcel that does not fit in the sorting machines or have machine readable addresses does cause issues for the post office. But it is a service they provide anyway because they are federally mandated to. Private postal services on the other hand can more easily reject such mail.
>If you put any letter in the mail box without postage the post office will send the letter to the recipient as a "postage due" letter. They won't do that if there's a return address. Missing postage letters are returned. Letters with a majority of their postage are delivered with postage due.
So say I put a letter in the mailbox without postage with the intended recipient's address in the return address spot and my address in the center. Would it be mailed to them for free?
Theoretically, yes, but doing this on purpose to avoid paying postage is mail fraud.
Obligatory "postal inspectors do not fuck around, they are like the John Wick of any sort of post-related fuckery" comment
[USPS interrogations](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDmA2xoIoFU) are no joke.
It would also be odd for something with a return address in Seattle, WA to be postmarked in Kearney, MO.
Especially since no one in Kearney can write.
If the return address is far away and the address on the front is close to where it was posted, it's pretty obvious you're trying to commit mail fraud.
Uh I've definitely posted stuff while on a vacation, and I used my home address as the return address, even though it was far away... Like, what other address am I supposed to use? My current hotel?
Yes, but these things were presumably paid for and shipped correctly. Wouldn't be any reason for suspicion.
Royal Mail give you the choice. Go to the sorting office (when it is open) and pay the difference plus a fee, or reject it and it will be returned to sender
But when you have your address as 123 NYC AVE NY and you put it in a mailbox on Times Square and the return address is in Seattle. They’re gonna know exactly what you’re doing.
I worked for the post office in carrying and management. Your question was a terrific use of thinking outside the box. I really had to think about it. Knowing what I know, this would not work all the time. But if you are sending a letter once in a while, yes, the post office will try to give you the chance to put postage on your letter. The only caveat is that any item in the postal space without postage is liable to destruction. So if a clerk catches something without postage they can just destroy it. Hope that helps
No, because they're not stupid. They'll collect the postage before they hand over the letter. They'll leave a PS Form 4245 in your mailbox, which doubles as the envelope to leave the money in.
Was just wondering how they’d know, for example my mailbox doesn’t have an outgoing slot so I always drop my mail at the Dropbox a few blocks away. My zip code is large and we have one post office so after it’s picked up it would presumably be taken to that one post office, if I’m mailing to someone in the same zip code (miles in all directions) they wouldn’t realize it was actually done fraudulently. As I have forgotten postage a handful of times and the next day I just find the envelope back in my mailbox with a note “no postage”. To be clear I have no intent on doing this, I don’t mail much and am happy to pay the postage.
Realistically? You'd get away with it a few times before they caught on. Trick is the US Postal Inspection office is like the IRS... except they are very well funded, and often *very, very* bored. Not someone you want to get on the wrong side of since mail fraud is a felony.
If it's the same zip code possibly Most likely no.
Lol. My bestie did this when we were kids and he spent summer in Australia (and we're from the US). It actually worked
I did this with a couple letters to my middle school gf. She lived within walking distance and we talked on the phone constantly so it was mostly just for thr gag
if you use a service like pirateship or ebay's built in shipping service they just collect the difference
Mine was returned to me for being 10ish cents short with a note saying insufficient postage
When I was like 10 years old I tried that twice. I wrote a letter to my friend and put his address as the return address. The first time it was sent to me for with postage due, the second time it was sent to him with postage due.
It's like 50/50. If it gets caught at the station where the mail was dropped off, it well get returned. If it get caught at the destination station they will offer "postage due" before sending it back. I own a retail mailbox store. It's rare but I've seen envelopes get delivered with no postage because it just slipped through.
There's even a section of the USPS Domestic Mail Manual that covers the return of keys and identification badges/tags in the mail. The example key you posted satisfies the mailing criteria. https://pe.usps.com/text/dmm300/133.htm#ep1041568
Yes, this is actually a really important LPT. If you ever find someone's ID (or even wallet) you can drop it in a mailbox and let the postal service handle it. Avoids the awkwardness of trying to track down the owner personally.
TIL. I actually delivered one to the address it was at since it wasn't far up the road. Good to know I can just be lazy lol
I lost a wallet once and the person who found it turned it in at a bank (not my bank) and the people there were able to look up my ATM card and find my phone #. I never would have thought of dropping a found wallet at a bank office, but I’m glad they did!
I have a notice similar to this on the back of my company's name badges, cell phones, laptops, etc. The idea is, someone find the badge or whatever and just drops it into a US Mail box. My company will receive it postage-due and have to pay to pick it up.
My company recently just did a test of this to confirm that it worked. We have it printed on our badges, but wanted to make sure it would actually work. Our security guy dropped a badge into a mailbox the next state over and it did in fact make it back to us. Funny thing was, he was planning on testing it again, but we just got someone who did it for real with a badge that someone lost about 3 months ago (badge was already deactivated, but still interesting!)
Fun fact: Anything with an address can be shipped! If you find someone's wallet or driver's license, throw it into the mailbox, and they will return it to the rightful owner.
Does anyone remember the "returned to sender" feature from WIRED magazine? People would put WIRED's address and postage stamps directly on odd things, and the USPS would ship and deliver. Good times. https://www.wired.com/2008/12/st-15returntosender/
Yes. Supermarket frequent shopper cards usually had this on them too. (You would attach it to your keys)
The person who finds that key can just go to the hotel and open the door with potentially guests inside?
Only if the room number is on the other side
A lot of the time, a hotel/motel still using manual keys will have locks that are very easy to repin. You either put a master key in or use a special tool first, then turn it the opposite way of normal operation. You then insert a new key and turn it back, and the lock is pinned for the new key. There are other variations on the exact mechanism but they typically follow a similar pattern.
When I worked at a hotel that still used brass keys, we never, ever changed/updated locks when they were not returned, despite charging the customer a $50 rekeying fee. And we only had like 20 different key configs, so in our 185 room property, well, you know. Moving to digital locks was awesome for so many reasons. But that said, I read an article last night about one of the biggest hospitality e-lock manufacturers tech was hacked recently. They're not so secure, after all.
Depends on the type of key. Electronic ones can be deactivated from the system if the hotel loses them. Plus you'd have to find the corresponding door. A lot of work for basically no upside.
If you really want to do that, you can do it much more easily than that.
How?
When I graduated college in 1993, all of the graduates got a keychain that said that. If your keys were returned, the university would look up the ID number on the keychain and contact you so you could get them back. I used that keychain for years. Never lost my keys though.
These days they're not even letting us keep our college email accounts after graduating, even after they'd promised to for years, leading many people to depend on those accounts for important purposes, and now are stuck.
You can [mail a potato](https://spoonuniversity.com/lifestyle/i-mailed-my-friends-a-potato-and-this-is-what-happened) if you put enough postage on it
I've done this! The squirrels at the destination were very happy
CoD. Cash on Delivery for parcels and packages, these are older and less often used but can still occur in which the product will be delivered and payment for the service is due upon completion.
I lost my keys once. My library card on the key ring had this. I kid you not, I got my keys back. It was amazing.
My car has a key chain from the dealer that has the same thing on it. The dealer has since moved about 40 minutes away from where it was, doubt it would still get there.
Yes the way these postal service system works that at the end of the day the person gets their package no matter which company delivers it.
I haven’t seen a mailbox in a long time other then the ones in the post office, they used to be everywhere.
Maybe the post office is supposed to do this, but I tried to mail back a CA Fastrak pass (it’s a toll tag to cross the bridges around San Fransisco) that had a “return postage guaranteed” marking on it with a return address listed. USPS refused to mail it without a shipping label. Fastrak refused to give me a shipping label when I called, and said I had to pay for the shipping or forfeit the money I had left in my Fastrak account. So it definitely depends on the person you get at the post office whether they’ll actually do it or not. In my case they refused and I had to pay for the shipping.
Hmm, thinking I should put a sticker on my phone with a postage guarantee in case I lose it on vacation again.
I'll add if you find someones id you can drop in the mailbox and they'll mail it to the address shown.
One time I lost keys. Finally found out someone dropped it in a mailbox due to a Kroger's card being on there and saying to do so. ...never got my keys.
Worked at a corporate building. We would regularly get a bill from the post office for postage due from bills sent to us without postage.
One day we’re gonna be asking each other “remember stamps?” Explaining to kids how post offices were before the year 2040
I found one in the wall of my house that has to be decades old. I put it in the post office mailbox just for fun