Packages just sit at the post office.

[capital_nick]

Just a rant to see if anyone's experienced something similar.

If I have prepaid prelabled packages, wait in line, and watch the clerk scan each one, the item is shipped that day if not early the next day.

If I drop off said packages in their designated drop-off area because I don't want to wait in line, they don't move for 3-4 days sometimes.  What is the difference between me handing the package to the clerk as opposed to placing it on the counter 5 feet away?  What's with the delay?  It's infuriating.

[theguitarpartsguy]

This does not happen at my local post office.  Mail goes out the same day if I get it there before 2:15 in the afternoon, whether I hand it across the counter to someone, or put it in the outgoing box slot, or put it in the mailbox outside.  I believe that if you want the answer to this, you'll probably have to call your post office and ask to talk to your postmaster.  

[1786davycrockett]

Those items left in the drop-off bin are considered "low priority," since the counter clerks (at least at my post office) have to leave the counter to process them, and the counter-work is never-ending.  The counter workers may get to them at the end of the day, or maybe early the next day; but, with the new Postmaster General's recent mandate on "NO OVERTIME ALLOWED," they might not get processed for days.

Better just to stand in line and get your packages scanned in a timely manner.

Don't get "infuriated" at the postal clerks -- the latest mandates from the new Postmaster General have made their jobs even WORSE!

[mbsals1993]

This has been happening to me a lot lately. I use small padded mailers, so I can just put them in my mailbox to be picked up. My postman scans them “picked up” and then they get scanned “accepted” when they reach the post office later that evening. The last couple weeks I get no scans on pickup and they sit in the post office for 3 days before being scanned accepted. I changed my handling time from 1 day to 3 days to compensate. Very frustrating.