So I was excited to get a lot of postcard swaps in the mail today. Suddenly my heart sank when I saw the back of one postcard with a giant X crossed over it. As it turns out my mail was misdelivered to another person in the building who crossed out the back of the postcard and wrote “MOVED” (even though the address was correct, it was just misdelivered). When I looked on the front of the postcard it had a big stamp mark from the post office that had several checkboxes, one of which was checked “Return to sender”. The stamp mark on the front of the postcard basically defaced the whole card. But somehow someone must have clued in that I had not moved and that it was all a big mistake, so the mailman delivered it to me after all.
It was kinda painful to see the postcard treated so disrespectfully on the back and the front. If I got someone else’s mail by accident, I would deliver it or put it back in the mailbox. This was my first mailbox horror story. Wondering if others have experienced any mailbox horrors?
What’s your mailbox horror story (if you have one)?
What did you end up doing with the postcard?
Jetoy cat postcards will be sent to 11 people whom I’ve announced on September 14th:
People can continue to post their mailbox horror stories, but only those announced on September 14th will be getting the free cat postcard. Thanks to everyone who shared their stories. Sorry I’m not able to send to places where we have a postal restriction in place.
This is mine, from two years ago. The postman thought it was a good idea to fold the postcard and use it as a wrapper around the rest of the post. Fortunately, they’re not my normal postman, but it does still happen, but very rarely. (Apologies, I know I’ve used this photo in another thread, but I couldn’t find it.)
My horror stories have more to do with the mailbox is getting broken into. I live in a community where all of our mailboxes are at one central location rather than in front of our house. I’ve lived in the same area for over 12 years and many of our mailboxes have been either vandalized or broken into.
When the boxes are not getting broken into, most of the large postcards do tend to get bent because it’s not a very big box.
It’s a shame what they did to your card, but at least it has very unique postal markings, to have made it to you in the end after being incorrectly marked up like that. If it were my card, I would add it to my cabinet of curiosities
This just happened recently: I live across the road from a vacant house that the owners only visit rarely, but it still has a mailbox, which got hit by a tractor recently and I saw that there was mail on the ground. Well, when I went to pick it up so it wouldn’t get rained on, I realized that, “Hey, this is my mail getting rained on!” There must have been a sub who didn’t read the addresses carefully, I guess. One of my postcards was already mildewed, too
You should complain to the postmaster in your city. I used to write (in pencil) on misdelivered mail and put it back in the box. One day I met the mail carrier at my box and she told me to not write anything on the envelope, just put it back in my box with the arm up and she would know it had been misdelivered by the postage date and postmark. Several months ago a postcard was left in my box addressed to someone in Maryland at a PO Box. I live in Florida! It was hard to read the writing on the message side, but I assume it was mailed from my town and they just assumed it was to me because I am probably the only one around here that sends and receives many postcards. But the zip code is no where near my number so why it wasn’t caught is beyond me.
But my horror story was when the mail carrier left notes on the inside and outside of our box that said “bees!!!” Bees were attempting to build a hive in
Our box. I hope she wasn’t stung!
I can imagine that show would be interesting. I don’t recall what kind of bees were in the mailbox ( it is metal) but we have an ongoing battle on our porches with carpenter bees, they chew holes in the wood posts snd ceiling and make quite a mess, and they harass us if we get too close. They have never actually attacked us or stung anyone but they make their presence known. And every year, we have plenty of bumblebees in our blooming shrubs and flowers. I actually like the bees but not the wasps!
I went to the First Day of Issue ceremony for Go Beyond (the Buzz Lightyear stamp issue) for the new film Lightyear. Well, it was the worst experience of my life. I came from San Diego to Hollywood. The first bus of the day and got no sleep and i had a duffell bag with me juat to make it in time at 9am. Even though there was a sign at the El Capitan Theater that announced to the public that here is the showing come in, I got treated like I was intruding. Eventually I made my way in. The USPS people were great. It was Disney’s employees who were the a ho’s. They had the place securitied up like it was Fort Knox. I thought Tim Allen voice of Buzz in Toy Story, or maybe Chris Evans, voice of Buzz in Lightyear was there. It was a snooze fest of a boring ceremony that lasted 15 minutes. They did the reveal all right on a screen. I usually see these reveals do a giant reveal with a large model on an easel or something. There was no Buzz either. Not even a Disney character in character. The Disney employees told me to take my bag down from the sales table when I was looking for my wallet and the USPS people had no problem with it and one particular security not in a suit but in regular clothes I could tell was looking at me the whole time. I of course ignored him. I had bought 4 sheets. And I ended up using 2 sheets which are 40 stamps to mail off the cards I’d prepared with the first day of issue postmark. Well after I got all the postmarks i left content. I made four for me but I wanted mailed through the system to get the little markings. I got them all right. Not the ones I wanted, instead I got others. Right in Buzz Lightyears face! Despite being postmarked, all mine got marker on the face ruining the cards. I checked other people’s and they got perfect cards. I have to resend them now to Stamp Fulfillment Services, new stamps and new cards for new postmarks. Its so disheartening. Now I don’t even want to.
Oh my gosh!! To have gone through all that trouble and then get pen canceled like that. I’m so sorry to hear what happened.
I’ve received and sent postcards that have been pen canceled before, and it is SO hard not to take it personally. It’s not like the postal worker knows who you are and are doing it out of spite, but… sometimes it sure does feel that way!
It’s like, dude, do you think I’d go through the trouble of using cute stamps or attending a first day of issue if I didn’t absolutely love stamps?? Can you at least use a skinnier pen or something?
This isn’t exactly a horror story, but a few times my postcard has been delivered to the wrong addresses. Whoever has received my mail has brought it back to my address. However, sometimes I have received torn postcards and some have been broken in a separate plastic bag.
This was over a decade ago, but some (then) kids of the neighborhood had got this wonderful prank idea to fill the bottoms of mailboxes with snow. The snow would melt a bit during a day (it was early spring) and then freeze again before people got back home from work to pick up the mail. I don’t think anybody’s mail was totally destroyed, but there were for sure some angry people trying to get their frozen mail out the box and the culprits were caught pretty soon.
Couple of months ago I noticed that the add newspapers I had left in the box (yeah, too lazy) had disappeared. After a closer look I realized that somebody had picked up mail from other people’s boxes and stuffed it under an old car that has been standing on the yard for a few years already and apparently started to leak oil. It seemed like they had selected only adds and such but I am still shocked about how anybody would just assume it is okay to take anything out from somebody else’s mailbox…
I haven’t yet talked with the owner of that old car, as they already got a talk from other neighbors and seemed to have realized their mistake, but I am keeping the situation on eye. There car is technically parked illegally so I am ready act in case they visit my mailbox again
I’ve only ever had amazing stories, thankfully! My local post people seem amazing, always up for a morning chat!
I ran up to one of them as he was taking the mail, I’d missed the last collection by a couple of minutes. I asked if he could take it, but added that I’d understand if not. He looked so confused that I’d ever think it would be an issue and was like “of course I can, no problem at all!”. Seen him a few times since and he will give me a smile if he notices me.
That’s awful!
I’m so sorry to hear what happened.
However, sometimes I have received torn postcards and some have been broken in a separate plastic bag.
