The Greenpoint Post Office. (Google Maps)
July 10, 2019 By Laura Hanrahan
Assembly Member Joseph Lentol is calling on the United States Postal Service Inspector General to complete an audit of mail delivery in North Brooklyn after hearing consistent complaints from local residents.
Lentol, whose calls are seconded by Senator Chuck Schumer, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Representative Carolyn Maloney and Representative Nydia Velazquez, says residents in North Brooklyn have for years had to deal with late deliveries, deliveries made to the wrong address, and not receiving their mail at all.
The electeds are asking the Inspector General to focus their audit on three zip codes in the Greenpoint and Williamsburg areas: 11222, 11211 and 11249.
“Residents of North Brooklyn rely on the United States Postal Service to deliver mail in a timely and efficient manner,” Lentol said. “Inadequate mail delivery in North Brooklyn leaves its residents without the ability to send and receive mail in a timely manner. I join my colleagues in government in calling on the United States Postal Service Inspector General to conduct a thorough review of mail services in North Brooklyn to ensure its residents are properly receiving mail.”
Constituents responded to Lentol’s announcement of the audit request on his Facebook page with gratitude and relief.
“This is decades overdue,” one commenter wrote. “I see Post Offices in other communities that are able to serve constituent needs without endless lines, lost packages, aggravation and frayed nerves, why can’t ours?”
Others reinforced the repeated issues they have had in the post offices in North Brooklyn when both sending and receiving mail.
“Every time I drop a prepaid package off to be returned to a vendor it’s about a week sometimes closer to two weeks before they even scan it into the system that it’s there,” one constituent wrote. “What is the reason for that? That’s before they even ship it out to send it back! [It is] horrible sometimes it takes two months for me to get a refund or an exchange on an item! I’ve never seen anything so horrible in my life!”
Others shared their experiences of going days without a postal delivery, only to later have a neighbor bring over a handful of mail that was mistakenly delivered to the wrong address.
“New Yorkers deserve better than the inadequate mail delivery service that many Brooklyn residents in Williamsburg, East Williamsburg and Greenpoint are experiencing right now,” said Schumer. “Not only are these problems, including missing and late mail delivery, an inconvenience to residents, but they could pose real problems for people awaiting critical and time-sensitive personal and professional mail.”
The office of the United States Postal Service Inspector General said that they have received the audit request and are looking into the matter.
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17 Comments
I really hope that things would be improved. Whenever I give my address, I keep my fingers crossed to receive the mail. It happened that I received some after more than one month, and one of them was completely lost. I had this same fear about receiving my Driving License, and well, it is been now one month and 3 weeks that I am waiting for it. The first time they sent it back to DMV saying that they could not deliver it. After Calling DMV they send it a second time; it is been now 2 weeks and still not received !
ALL of Brooklyn needs a USPS audit. Take a look at the Bushwick location on Broadway. It’s the definition of hell. Mail is routinely misdelivered/stolen/marked as delivered when not/ lost/ not left where it’s supposed to be etc. etc.
Yes I’ve experienced this problem in Greenpoint for years I get so much mail that’s not mine! And the lines are really long at the post office they need help!
The post office said my package was undeliverable because “mailbox was blocked”. My mailbox is in the Lobby and certainly not blocked, ever. Then via email I pointed out it was MLK day and the Post Office is closed on that National Holiday, I received no reply. Amazon re-sent my order when I proved with a link to Post Office website there is no way this package was delivered or delivery attempt was made because it was Martin Luther King day!
Finally! After years of having complaints handled by this PO investigating itself! Unprofessional and lazy is just part of the problem. My mail never arriving, mail for someone on other side of Brooklyn delivered to me, mail piled to the ceiling while someone strolls behind glass window arguing with customers AND the unsupervised, under-supplied & extremely filthy condition of the place, I wondered why this PO was not shut down altogether.
They should check several PO in all Boros. I am in 11102, when my regular carrier is off or on vacation, the mail gets marked “ returned to sender” to clean out the PO. Is this a scam to make people pay the postage twice?
Who is suppose to help us ?
Well one suggestion is contacting john venable customer relations
coordinator for triboro district usps at there forbel st complex
718-348-3341
John.p.venable@usps.gov
Express your concerns, start a letter writing marathon to the postmaster for triboro district usps
Get informed delivery and for those who don’t have it because of a error message it’s not availbile yet in your area is false information
Usps doesn’t want to take the fix the computer glitch with address codes on buildings not eligible for informed. Delivery
Create a social media page and documentation of pictures of videos of things out of ordinary with usps operations. Clearly something there not doing correct not someone who is actually doing there job. There are a lot of great postal employees that do there job in these zip codes that had
Apples bring down the image of usps triboro district operations
Lastly, educate your self on usps operations through the carrier blue book. There internal guideline book for usps mail operations found by google it. Reason I mention that is when you make a complaint management tends to keep coming up with different excuses on why mail ia missing or etc. rather then just admitting carrier is not doing there job. Hope this helps more voices heard more compliant submissions to triboro district and better education for the public only way to solve this problem besides the audit which good and I’m glad our reps took this action
Another thing the post office does with Registered/Certified Return Receipt mail is they leave the ‘pink slip’ in your mailbox to release the delivery of the letter for next day delivery and then they don’t deliver the letter claiming you ‘signed the pink slip’ acknowledging you got the letter
The mailperson comes to my building AFTER 6pm every night.. its absurd! the mail comes AFTER i get home from work! This post office is THE worse and trust me I grew up using the PO on debevoise .. thats a very close 2nd to be the worse!! The attitude of these clerks need a massive readjustment!
We usually get mail ever day. Lately three days at a time will go by with no mail. When we complain to the post office nothing happens. When we complain to the carrier he is just rude
It is about time…mail carriers are constantly on their phones!!! Post office in 11222 zip is very disorganized
I certainly hope something, anything be done. As a business owner, I never get mail inspite my complaining to the PO Manager and Postmaster General . My Bill’s are always late, I see the mailman/women just pass my ofc. And deliver to other companies, but not mine. This h as s been going on for 2 1/2 years.
So thank you Assemblyman Lentol.
OH WOW! Am I happy to see this article! I refuse to patronize the Greenpoint post office anymore because the staff there are rude, incompetent and LAZY! I have had the experience of being turned away from mailing a package because they ran out of supplies.
My neighbor’s rent checks would be missing for weeks.
I have WATCHED postal workers just throw mail on the floors of vestibules, not even bothering to put the mail in the mailboxes.
There is one single mail carrier, an older Asian man, who is wonderful, professional and I hope he doesn’t lose his job but the beast of a woman at the window in the post office, I hope she loses her job.
They also constantly have my packages “go missing”. I’ve had at least a dozen instances in past 4 years where all of the tracking information says it was delivered and its definitely not. My building has security cameras in it and each time, the package never even crosses my threshold. I have almost everything delivered to my office now to save myself time and frustration. This post office is the absolute worst.
about time loss so many packages and unsent bills
This had gotten so much worse with the population explosion in these zip codes. If you have to go to the post office on So 4th Street your looking at an hour long line so getting mail at 7 or 8 o’clock is no shocker its terrible
Agreed mail delivery is at an all time low. I don’t receive it or it comes at 8:00 pm. Increase of postage for inadequate service.