Headlines like these come from across the country. Massachusetts: “Mail stolen from USPS mailbox outside Massachusetts town’s post office.” California: “Those blue USPS mailboxes? Don’t leave your mail in them, postal inspector says.” Minnesota: “Someone stole three blue mail collection boxes off St. Paul streets.” Texas: “What is being done to protect your mail from getting stolen.” Where can RVers safely ship their mail?
Service embarrassingly asks us not to use “blue boxes”
Maneuvering a big motorhome or pulling a towable is tricky enough. Getting into a post office parking lot may just be impossible. Handy blue USPS mailboxes on a street or along the edge of a parking lot have been the staple of travelers for decades when it comes time to put mail into the system.
For some time, the Postal Service itself has actually been imploring people to not even use those blue mail boxes. For the Postal Service, already on the hot seat for ever-increasing postage costs and jokes about “snail delivery,” pleading with the citizenry not to use official mailboxes must have been nearly unbearable in the “image department.”
“Hardened” blue boxes deployed
Now the Service says it’s beefing up security on those old blue boxes. In conjunction with its “Project Safe Delivery,” which the Service instituted to enhance safety for both postal workers and the mail they handle, blue mail boxes are getting a makeover. Since last May, “tens of thousands of hardened blue boxes” have been deployed to replace more easily burgled boxes. Most of these have been “strategically deployed in high postal crime areas.”
What constitutes “tens of thousands”? A release from the Service last week says 15,000 of the tough-guy blue boxes are already on the streets, and 8,500 are set to be installed. Apparently an Achilles’ heel of the blue boxes are their locks. Some 28,000 electronic locks have been installed in blue boxes.
The Postal Service hasn’t detailed how consumers can discern whether a blue box is one of the new-issue boxes. Perhaps a giveaway would be no keyhole, but an electronic lock. The Service has crowed that its efforts have resulted in reductions of stolen mail complaints by a third. All that since last November.
Where can RVers safely ship their mail? Here are some alternatives
Until we can be more sure of the security of postal service mailboxes, where can RVers safely ship their mail? Ask the park staff to see that your mail is given to the carrier if you’re staying in an RV park. Where else to post? Some mail service outfits like UPS Stores may be willing to accept your Postal Service mail as a measure of goodwill. You may find the fuel desk at the truck stop you “fill up” at could also be willing to take your outgoing letters.
Of course, wherever possible, simply avoid snail mail. Use electronic payment methods wherever you can. Not only will your payments be safer—you won’t have to pay for a stamp.
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Thank you, Russ and Tina! 🙂 Wow! I had no idea that the blue boxes were so unsecure. We do most things electronically now. I have set up all of Momma’s bills to be paid on-line, too; she’s 92. I still snail-mail Christmas cards with an annual up-date inside, but rarely post anything else. Thank you for the news; safe travels! 🙂
I’m guessing they never really had to be secured Neal, back when the warning sign about tampering with US Mail…blah blah fine or imprisonment blah blah blah was respected. We sent criminals to jail in those days though, not to a shrink to find out why they are angry at society.
Thank you, Cancelproof! Never thought about that, but we were so rural (still are, I guess) that we usually only saw them outside a post office. Safe travels! 🙂
I haven’t seen a blue mailbox out on the street in our area for decades – only in front of the Post Office.
I’m so old I remember when we used postal zones instead of zip codes Mine was on S Culper St, Zone 6, VA
The crooks are even robbing mailmen and woman. Some after their keys to these boxes and packages. Crooks and thieves don’t fear jail anymore.
Jail, what’s that. Oh wait, for people not paying their taxes on time. Not criminals.
Not paying taxes is a crime.
Oh, I remember when the threat of jail got ones attention – because it was not an idle threat! I also remember more decent times and attitudes. What have we become….?