"Your Generosity Appreciated" from the mailman

[JRon]

I’ve always wondered about how to tip the trash guys too. Maybe tape it to the top of the can? And I’m not sure if the trash and the recycling and the yard waste are picked up by the same or different teams.

We wondered about that too and thought maybe the day we tape the card to the trash or recycling can there would be a sub driving so our regular drivers wouldn't get it. So we have been sending 2 cards with $20 in each to our trash service office with a note asking them to give the cards to our trash and recycling drivers. We get a thank you back from the office which is nice.

 

[sengsational]

Oh, no! Another tipping thread.

All I do is wave and smile.
But I did learn something (the max tip reg).

 

[Amethyst]

Oh, I forgot about this. Yes, "Mario" has done it.

I've had my mail box (rural) stuffed with a package where I literally had to cut it open with a knife and screwdriver because I couldn't physically remove it because it was packed in there so tight. Doing that at night with a flashlight isn't so much fun. All because the person was too d**m lazy to walk it down 50 ft.

.

I was on the GS scale, which doesn't account for one's field of expertise. Anyway the whole "do govt employees make as much as private sector" is not germane here...a letter carrier making $50K doesn't seem like much, until you look at the people he or she is serving, and notice that a general "thanks for your generosity" is going to many who are unemployed, on welfare, Social Security, or working 2 jobs to amount to $50K. And not getting 6 weeks of leave a year after 15 years' service, either.

Please notice, I did not say they don't deserve the 6 weeks' leave.

 

[Time2]

He should have stopped at "Happy Holidays, from my family to yours."


Edit: $17.48 per hour
14% Below national average
https://www.indeed.com/cmp/United-States-Postal-Service/salaries/Mail-Carrier

Not sure that includes medical and pension, also they most likely get paid holidays. Many people don't get these.

 

[calmloki]

We had the same carrier up north for a decade or more. Never tipped Mike, considered him a friend and would wish him Merry Christmas. Now have random temps doing our route as a filler - I put in our forwarding order before we went South and taped our box under the lid with a "Please Forward" note visible. Gal watched as a temp moved the tape to stuff mail in anyway. She called him on it and he shrugged and said it wasn't his normal route. Wow. Went South and learned that Christian, our carrier of many years, has moved on. He always got cookies. Vincent, our new carrier, will as well since he goes a little beyond rote service.

Off topic, but awesome: yesterday evening a Fedex driver brought a package to the door - it was addressed to our house number and town, but had the street name 3 streets away. He said he went there and found a vacant lot, but he called his dispatcher and they worked out where we are and he made his delivery. Now that is service! Didn't tip him either. To me, a sincere thank you is natural while a tip seems like a demeaning gesture. Should maybe rethink that.

 

[Dash man]

He should have stopped at "Happy Holidays, from my family to yours."


Edit: $17.48 per hour
14% Below national average
https://www.indeed.com/cmp/United-States-Postal-Service/salaries/Mail-Carrier

That is likely the starting wage for a part time worker. I worked for the Postal Service for a year when I got out of the military in the 1990s. When you count years of service it goes up significantly, especially when they become a “Regular” employee.

 

[harllee]

A bunch of different USPS workers bring mail to my house and none of them do a decent job. No tip for them.

The garbage people are much better--I should do something for them.

 

[Dash man]

We had the same carrier up north for a decade or more. Never tipped Mike, considered him a friend and would wish him Merry Christmas. Now have random temps doing our route as a filler - I put in our forwarding order before we went South and taped our box under the lid with a "Please Forward" note visible. Gal watched as a temp moved the tape to stuff mail in anyway. She called him on it and he shrugged and said it wasn't his normal route. Wow. Went South and learned that Christian, our carrier of many years, has moved on. He always got cookies. Vincent, our new carrier, will as well since he goes a little beyond rote service.

Off topic, but awesome: yesterday evening a Fedex driver brought a package to the door - it was addressed to our house number and town, but had the street name 3 streets away. He said he went there and found a vacant lot, but he called his dispatcher and they worked out where we are and he made his delivery. Now that is service! Didn't tip him either. To me, a sincere thank you is natural while a tip seems like a demeaning gesture. Should maybe rethink that.

We had a UPS driver stop in front of our house yesterday. We were expecting a package. He got out with a package and took it across the street and left it at their door. We got the deliver confirmation text from UPS and Amazon. Fortunately our neighbors are honest folk and they brought it over.

 

[Time2]

BTW I respect gov't workers for the job they perform.

I suspect gov't workers are almost on par with all workers. Why almost? because it is so hard to fire them. (Like the teachers that set in the rubber room and run their business while getting paid because they can't be fired)
So there are probably more bad apples in gov't.
That said, I think my local city maintenance type workers are very poor.
/rant on/ I just see to many on job sites doing nothing. There was 4" pipe that had a leak, there were 7 guys and 3 trucks there to fix it. A 3ft deep by 4ft x 1 ft hole was dig, one guy fixed the pipe. 6 guys did nothing. Another time, I had a small business on a marina with a pavilion, as an improvement they wrapped the posts with a large rope and secured it. There were 8 posts, the young guy was working diligently getting a post done, I heard the older guy say, hey, slow down we can make this job last until Friday, it was Tuesday. On my walk, there was portion of road that got washed out, there were 2 trucks and a backhoe on site, when I walked by, two men were in the truck using some app on their phone and one was in the backhoe, also

with his phone on an app. I reported a water leak, "ya, we will get to that, we are running three to four weeks behind." We had a good aquaintance, that was a supervisor of a city work crew, his common complaint was, I can't get the guys to do the work, I usually end up doing it myself.

/rant off/
btw, probably not a good idea to piss off your mail carrier, retribution could be costly. (undelivered bills, checks, lottery winnings, jury duty summons)

 

[austin944]

How do you tip these folks. Not how much, but how. The mail man is someone I know by first name, but if I put it in the mail box, how do I know he got it and not someone else, like when he takes a day off.

Maybe you could put out a note when you are home, attached to the mailbox or garbage can, saying that you have a tip ready for them at your residence, if they come up and knock.

 

[Mark1]

No tips for the postal workers at my house, but I did tip the two garbage men $20 each last Monday. I'm sure the garbage men have no benefit package like the postal workers, plus my garbage men go out of the way to pick up my garbage. They are the only vendor that actually drives down an unmaintained county road to pick up my garbage in front of my house. All the other folks who live on my road have to wheel their garbage up to the main road.

Maybe it is a bribe and not really a tip, but they seem quite happy to see me every December when I come out to greet them.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

SO MANY ASSUMPTIONS on this thread! Keep in mind that a lot of the USPS carriers that are out there are CONTRACTORS...so they may not get these "fantastic government benefits" that have been discussed here.

We have tipped our carriers for years...cash in an envelope and put in the box. They usually leave a thank you card/note as well.

We have a neighbor who owns/runs a DSP for Amazon (contract last mile delivery...most of the deliveries you get from AMZN come from these DSPs) and was telling us that his drivers are always so tickled to get snacks/etc. when they deliver stuff. I hadn't really thought about this, but thought that it was a good idea. I put a box out on the front porch with a sign that says we appreciate them and to grab a couple snacks. It seems pretty popular and I have had to refill it a couple of times already. I haven't seen anyone abuse it since there is a pretty wide selection.

We used to tip the garbage folks too, but now that it's all automated (they don't get out of the truck) I have stopped that practice. When we were doing it, when we heard them down the road, I would go tape it in an envelope to the top of the bin.

 

[street]

Never got a card etc. for a carrier. I will add thou I have never tipped or gifted anything to any of the delivery people. I do thank them regularly for their work they do. I see so many bad things said, about the mail service and delivery companies that it makes me sick. I know the service hasn't been what most would want it to be but I appreciate everything these people do to get me the mail or product.

 

[cathy63]

It is even more often, here! We re-delivered 4x this year and had neighbors bring us mail 3X; I have a neighbor's bills on the table right now. Somebody in the chain has literacy issues, or needs glasses.

With this additional information, I would just assume that his note was intended to be a thank-you to someone else on the route who left him a gift and he misdelivered it to you.

 

[Amethyst]

Quite...It occurred to me that the way the note was worded, he could tell his superiors that "I was just thanking all the kind people who insist on leaving me envelopes full of money." I still think it would not be looked on favorably.

Everyone is welcome to go back and forth on which people deserve tips, leave tips for the letter carriers, and particularly your dental hygienist, who is unlikely to be paid enough for the task of peering and scraping inside everyone's mouth. That is always a personal decision.

I continue to think a blanket solicitation from the mail carrier is in poor taste.

With this additional information, I would just assume that his note was intended to be a thank-you to someone else on the route who left him a gift and he misdelivered it to you.

 

[Amethyst]

By all means, tell people when they do a good job. Tip them if you want.

I still think a blanket solicitation for tips is in poor taste.

Never got a card etc. for a carrier. I will add thou I have never tipped or gifted anything to any of the delivery people. I do thank them regularly for their work they do. I see so many bad things said, about the mail service and delivery companies that it makes me sick. I know the service hasn't been what most would want it to be but I appreciate everything these people do to get me the mail or product.

 

[Bestwifeever]

Eh, send them to me--unconditionally tipping is my hobby

 

[REWahoo]

To add to the salary/benefit discussion, my rural carrier is a postal contractor, not a USPS employee. As a contractor she has no benefits and a salary, from what I can glean from giggling the interweb, might be in the low 40's. Knowing what time she shows up at the PO each morning to sort mail (7am) and the length of her route (~75 miles R/T), I think it is rare she works less than 10 hours each day - six (6) days a week. During the holiday rush she probably works close to 12, maybe more. She drives her own personal vehicle and sure I hope she gets some sort of reimbursement for mileage.

My point for the above: She darn sure deserves all the unsolicited gifts of gratitude she gets this time of year.

 

[target2019]

Not sure that includes medical and pension, also they most likely get paid holidays. Many people don't get these.

Yes, I mentioned these in another post.

 

[FDC319]

You sorta missed her entire statement about that...

I will see if I can find a source for actual USPS salaries...

Just because I didn't post her entire post doesn't mean I missed it.

 

[FDC319]

I am a retired Federal government employee. Our health insurance is more expensive than the Postal workers'. One thing I did not do, even when I was at the bottom of the pay scale, and that's hint around for tips. Had I done such a thing I would have been reprimanded.

At no point did I hint they make a "ton" of money. I said they often are paid better than people in the areas they serve, which is hard to argue with, especially in this year of incredibly widespread unemployment. It seems to me very inappropriate to blanket your route with "thanks for your generosity" cards.

and? He made a choice and you made a choice.

Regarding the "incredibly widespread unemployment" this year, I'm having a hard time feeling sympathetic. I made a choice at 18 and others made their own choices.

I have now said stated twice in this thread that I do not support anyone soliciting for tips.

 

[W2R]

Our mailman changes every month or so. Often they do not show up but instead, just park their truck in front of somebody's house and sit in it for hours (perhaps boozing it up in the truck, or playing with a cell phone, which I'm sure is more fun than delivering mail). When they do show up, they seldom deliver mail to the actual address on the envelope so frequently residents have to re-deliver most of their mail.

It's simply amazing that they can find so many utterly irresponsible and incompetent people as they have found to deliver mail in our neighborhood. Maybe they are recruiting among the homeless drug addicts under that bridge downtown. I'm serious - - we do not live in Mayberry RFD when it comes to mail delivery. Of course all of this has been reported multiple times by my neighbors over the years, but nothing has been fixed.

Since I have no idea who my mailman even is (this week), I have no intention of leaving a tip.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

To add to the salary/benefit discussion, my rural carrier is a postal contractor, not a USPS employee. As a contractor she has no benefits and a salary, from what I can glean from giggling the interweb, might be in the low 40's. Knowing what time she shows up at the PO each morning to sort mail (7am) and the length of her route (~75 miles R/T), I think it is rare she works less than 10 hours each day - six (6) days a week. During the holiday rush she probably works close to 12, maybe more. She drives her own personal vehicle and sure I hope she gets some sort of reimbursement for mileage.

My point for the above: She darn sure deserves all the unsolicited gifts of gratitude she gets this time of year.

That is my experience. Ours runs around in a car that is probably on its last leg and I see him around town all hours of the day. Very often (especially this season), he will have packages sticking out through the sunroof. I also know that he has to make multiple trips to the PO to load up more mail. Hard work, for sure.

 

[target2019]

Just because I didn't post her entire post doesn't mean I missed it.

Sorry. I went back and looked and you did post all of her OP.

 

[ncbill]

We leave them a loaf of homemade bread...zucchini, etc.