MailmanDave
17 Years Experience
Long Island, NY
Male, 43
I am a City Letter Carrier for the US Postal Service in NY. I've been a city letter carrier for over 17 years and it is the best job I've ever had. I mostly work 5 days per week (sometimes includes a Saturday) and often have the opportunity for overtime, which is usually voluntary. The route I deliver has about 350 homes and I walk to each of their doors to deliver the mail. Please keep in mind that I don't have authority to speak for the USPS, so all opinions are solely mine, not my employer.
Congratulations on being hired as a CCA for the USPS. I can't say for sure that it's true that you won't get a day off. From what I've seen, the CCAs where I work often work 7 days a week but it seems after a couple of weeks they are given a day off. I don't know if there are any rules that you must be given a day off after working a certain amount of consecutive days. It may depend on the staffing level of your facility. I hope that you have chosen to join the NALC. Whether you have or not, a shop steward may have a better answer than I've given you on whether or not you are required to work unlimited days in a row. I'm also on a Facebook group for postal workers. One is NALC and the other is Postal Maniacs. If you join them, you could post this same question and get answers from actual CCAs. Good luck to you. Please work safely and deliver the mail accurately. Sunday delivery usually consists of Amazon.com package delivery, not regular mail.
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I don't know where you can find this information as to if it's in our ELM or JCAM since I'm not involved in contract administration whatsoever. Your shop steward might have an answer plus I think some offices operate differently even if it's in violation of a nationally agreed upon procedure. It also depends on whether or not you are a CCA or if you're a Regular. If you're a Regular carrier, it also depends on whether or not you are on the ODL. That will determine if they can mandate you in on your SDO (also known as your NS day). In the office where I work, CCAs don't technically have a scheduled day off and should be checking the schedule daily to confirm when/if they need to report for work the next day. As far as regular carriers go, it seems that our management makes the schedule up on a daily basis but probably does a rough draft in the later part of the previous week. The schedule is on a clipboard on the supervisors desk. I've heard in other offices the management will usually post the following weeks schedule by Wed. of the previous week. I don't know the real rules probably because it doesn't seem to be much of an issue in my office (except maybe when we are very short-handed) and I like to work a lot of OT if it's available. I'm not willing to do the research to give you a more definitive answer which is why I've referred you to other sources that maybe could assist you.
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Hello CP2015, I'm not sure what POCs are but I'll guess and say those are the amt of possible deliveries you have each day which sounds like a lot to me. It isn't easy to work outside in the summer when the sun is pounding down on you. While I prefer the heat vs the extreme cold, the summer can be taxing on your body. I'd recommend wearing a wide-brimmed hat to keep the sun off your eyes, face, and neck. I also recommend drinking as much water as you can even before you get thirsty. It sweats off of you pretty quickly so the more you stay hydrated the better you should feel. In terms of actually burning, I suppose you could apply sunscreen liberally with an SPF of 40+. Stay safe and thanks for writing.
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I don't know what the remedy is for this. Is there some plastic cover that could be put on top of the cluster box or does the rain leak in from the side? It sounds quite negligent of the landlord not to keep the cluster box in satisfactory condition so the mail doesn't get wet and ruined. If you bring this up to the USPS, I wondering if they would just refer you to the landlord and a cycle of frustration would continue. We have a note that we give to individual residences that says "your mailbox needs attention" when there is an issue, but if I don't know if that would pertain to a cluster box and the landlord may not even see the note if he isn't there. If all of the residents who receive mail in that cluster box would sign a joint letter and mail it to the landlord requesting the box be repaired or replaced, maybe that would carry some weight.
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I doubt that mail is picked up from the blue outside mailboxes on a federal holiday (02/15/16 Washington's Birthday, for example). I can only speak for where I work but I think there are no trucks with collection box mail going from most POs to a mail processing facility. At the PO where I work in Long Island, NY the building is shut on Sundays and Holidays (except for most of December when we deliver parcels from our PO) and nobody is emptying the blue outside collection boxes. In summary, whether you mail the letter this Monday (02/15/16) or Tuesday, (02/17/16) it shouldn't make a difference on the speed of processing it.
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David, you certainly may say you prefer a non-driving delivery assignment, but I don't know if that will be honored. Quite honestly driving a postal vehicle is sometimes a fundamental part of the job, I know you were hired in Manhattan so that driving a postal vehicle may not be as vital. If you don't want to drive a vehicle, you are of more limited use to the organization which relies on the flexibility of the CCA workforce. I don't want to get your hopes up that it will be fine to avoid driving s postal vehicle all of the time. The truth is I don't know how it works in Manhattan, but most communities around the US would likely need you to drive.
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That certainly sounds fishy, especially with mail of a similar name to your Dad, and also nearby addresses. I suppose you could alert local law enforcement or USPS Postal Inspection Service but have no idea what their response would be. If mail arrives at your address with dad's name a little bit "off", he could open it and if it's anything like an unpaid bill he could either do nothing about or call the creditor and say that it's not him.
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