US (home) mail boxes

[Buckshot Bear]

Always seen these in US movies, is it true that the red flag indicates that there is outgoing mail to be picked up? or does it indicate that there has been mail delivered (ie you can look outside your window and know you have mail)?

If the former, how good is that! We sure can't mail letters that way here in Oz!

 

[Larsen E. Pettifogger, SASS #32933]

Yep, toss in your mail and flip up the flag and they will stop to pick up the outgoing even if you have no incoming that day.

[Doc Shapiro]

Signal to the postman (or woman) that there's outgoing mail in the box. 

 

I take outgoing mail to the post office.  We had outgoing bills stolen from our mailbox, and the checks were "edited" in an attempt at fraud.  Thankfully I caught it quickly and cancelled the checks.  The bank didn't honor them and we weren't out anything.  Neither the postmaster nor law enforcement was interested in pursuing the case.

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

In 1976, I moved into a new house in a new development in a small town, put up the flag, mailman did not pick up my mail. I spoke to the postmaster. From then on the mailman picked up my mail.

 

about 2000, I read about common scams and frauds on the FBI website. One of them involved meth heads who would drive around rural neighborhoods and pick up outgoings mail which usually contained checks or even birthday cards with cash gifts.  After that I on,y used a POBox.

[Marshal Mo Hare, SASS #45984]

A not always known fact. You may have put the box there but it is the property of the US Gov’t. Nobody else can legally put anything in it

[watab kid]

while ive never used it - yes it is supposed to indicate outgoing mail , 30 years ago when i moved into my house i built a "cover" for my "us mail box" that mimicks my home ......somewhat architectural ............the woodpeckers have taken a toll but it prevents use of the flag, that said ive always felt better for putting my outgoing in the local post office drop box - so i do , not sure why , i just do and feel better of it - doing it tomorrow , 

[Father Kit Cool Gun Garth]

When our original mailbox got run over and we put up the new mailbox,

   

I also installed a camera in case it happens again.

I've been able to see if anyone has subsequently opened it other than the mail person. 

 

 

[Sixgun Seamus]

Built my house in 1978. We're on our 16th mailbox due to vandalism, snowplows, etc. We can't see our mailbox from the house. The crappier I let the mailbox look, the lower the vandalism rate.

[Cypress Sun]

My gal still puts her outgoing mail in the mailbox with the flag up. She sells homemade crafts and such. The only problem she's had is with USPS not checking in the pre-paid postage so that tracking can be recognized. At times, it has taken days for the package to be checked in. This means that when the customer tracks their package, it shows that the shipping label has been initiated but has not been shipped even though the package was picked up by USPS days ago. The customer then thinks that she is slow in shipping which isn't the case. She has complained to USPS, they do nothing. She then complains to me.

 

Me personally, I won't post anything from the mailbox and haven't for well over 35 years. Long ago, I saw a car driving down my street with 2 guys in it. They were stopping at every mailbox, opening the door and closing it. I thought they were putting some ad in the mailboxes which is illegal but happens all the time. I went out to look but there was nothing in there, went next door - same thing. They were stealing incoming/outgoing mail. Right after that, I saw a mail truck driving down a main road with mail flying out of the back like confetti. After that, no more mailbox for me.

[Dusty Devil Dale]

18 hours ago, Doc Shapiro said:

Signal to the postman (or woman) that there's outgoing mail in the box. 

 

I take outgoing mail to the post office.  We had outgoing bills stolen from our mailbox, and the checks were "edited" in an attempt at fraud.  Thankfully I caught it quickly and cancelled the checks.  The bank didn't honor them and we weren't out anything.  Neither the postmaster nor law enforcement was interested in pursuing the case.

The more sophisticated thieves steal the outgoing check, get the account numbers and make their own checks to use in emptying the account.  You don't know anything until 30 fraudulent checks show up on the bank statement ---after the account is nearly drained.  

 

[Doc Shapiro]

1 hour ago, Dusty Devil Dale said:

The more sophisticated thieves steal the outgoing check, get the account numbers and make their own checks to use in emptying the account.  You don't know anything until 30 fraudulent checks show up on the bank statement ---after the account is nearly drained.  

 

These guys weren’t that Sophisticated. Thankfully the bank took care of us and no losses. 

[Buckshot Bear]

So I gather this would have been a great idea back in the day when people had morals.

[Michigan Slim]

11 minutes ago, Buckshot Bear said:

So I gather this would have been a great idea back in the day when people had morals.

Pretty much it, yeah.

[Alpo]

I remember back in the late '80s or early 90s they said you should not make out your income tax payment to the IRS. Make it out to the internal revenue Service. If you make it out to IRS, that leaves plenty of room on the payee line. Someone basically puts a N at the front of the I, making it an M. IRS now says Mrs. Write a woman's name after Mrs, and have your female confederate cash the check.

[J.D. Daily]

I live on a country rd. that the USPS doesn't deliver mail.  All the mail boxes are located a mile away at the intersection with a rd. that runs to the interstate hwy.  In the 9 years living here we have always put outgoing mail in a box at the post office.  Years ago I had someone steal a package containing a XL650 press enhancement out of our box.  The funny thing is I found the open package with the part in it 6 months latter on the side of the rd. while walking the dogs.  A few months ago when checking my mail box I noticed every box (approx. 10) on the corner had the door open.   The misses talked to a clerk at the post office for advice on getting a locking type box.  The delivery person can't open it so it is built like a USPS mail box with a door that is constructed so that when opened you can't reach in and remove the contents.  It must have been >30 years ago when living in a suburb in the SF East Bay that some thief lifted a box of checks from our mail box.  It was an observant bank teller in a city 15 miles away that caught a forged check when a woman tried to cash it.  Either the bank had experienced recent fraudulent checks from the city I lived in or the teller thought it odd that my wife would have visited a hair dresser in East Oakland & had services more appropriate for nappy haired women.  The teller called the misses who verified the check was bogus.  We change account numbers.

[Three Foot Johnson]

Sixty six+ years ago, growing up on this 4 1/2 mile stretch of road, there were maybe 5 or 6 mailboxes along the route. Today, there are at least 250 homes, some with multiple mailboxes. Due to mail theft, the dozen people on my side road got together and installed a bank of locking mailboxes a decade or so back - the outgoing mail isn't locked, of course, so there's still that. I normally take outgoing mail with me when I go to town and drop it in the drive-by box in the post office parking lot, but the mailboxes all have red flags on them to indicate outgoing mail if you want to do it that way, but I'm a mile and a half up the mountain at the end of the road - no way to see what's going on down there at the mailboxes.

 

Twelve days ago, I sent a $200 check to my daughter in Great Falls, via the post office parking lot mailbox - 90 miles of Interstate all the way to Great Falls, or a 30 minute flight if it goes by air... it hasn't arrived yet, and it hasn't cleared my bank as of this afternoon, so nobody else has cashed it yet either.

 

I have old mail in a box here somewhere addressed to my grandparents simply as, [NAME], white house east of East Helena, MT. I found one from the 60's addressed to my dad as, [NAME], East Helena, MT - We lived about 10 miles out of town, about 2000 population.

[Three Foot Johnson]

16 days, and my check finally arrived in Great Falls. Lessee... 90 miles in 384 hours is an average speed of less than a quarter mile per hour...

[Sixgun Sheridan]

29 minutes ago, Three Foot Johnson said:

16 days, and my check finally arrived in Great Falls. Lessee... 90 miles in 384 hours is an average speed of less than a quarter mile per hour...

 

Yup, you could've walked it over to her and it'd gotten there faster.

 

Decades ago there was a rash of vandalism in my neighborhood where punks were smashing mailboxes with a bat or club. One neighbor finally got fed up with it, filled a mailbox with concrete and set it out on the road. After a few days he found a broken baseball bat on the ground next to it.