Filing Claims for USPS Missing Parcels

Introduction

I order USPS yearly stamps every year. In September 2024, USPS notified me that I could pre-order the 2024 yearly stamps, so I placed an order immediately. I did not track the order until the end of the year, only to find that the order had already been delivered in November. I was extremely disappointed because I had never received the order and USPS never sent out notifications to me when they shipped the order.

In this blog post, I would like to share my experience of filing claims for USPS missing parcels.

Filing Claims for USPS Missing Parcels

Because the order indicated that it was insured, I filed a claim with USPS and wanted my money back. I got immediately rejected and the reason shown in the system was that the order had already been delivered. I felt extremely pissed off because if the order had already been delivered, why would I file a claim? There is, however, still an option for me to file an appeal. This time, I decided not to file an appeal online immediately because I was worried that this stupid USPS system would reject my appeal again because of stupid reasons. Instead, I decided to go to USPS in person to find out what was going on.

It turns out that not every USPS branch could investigate my case. I had to go to a specific branch that was responsible for the delivery in my area. However, it’s impossible for the user to know which exact branch was responsible for the delivery. I had to go to a random USPS branch to find it out first, which wasted me some time. After I found out the branch that was responsible for the delivery, I went there and one of the supervisors helped me to investigate the case. He first explained to me why my refund claim was rejected immediately. It was because the claim was screened by an algorithm based on some pre-configured criteria. If the claim did not meet the criteria, it would be rejected immediately. The supervisor then helped me to check the delivery record to ensure the parcel has been scanned and the address labeled was correct. I realized that USPS takes photo of each parcel and the address labeled on my parcel in the photo was correct. So it must have been delivered incorrectly to someone else. The supervisor requested the mailman to check all the parcel boxes in my area to see if my parcel was still there somewhere. The supervisor suggested me that if in two work days I still could not see my parcel delivered I shall file an appeal online and described that I had already visited the branch in person to discuss with the supervisor and I had a history of ordering USPS yearly stamps every year. When I went back home and tried to appeal online, I found it very stupid that the system limited the number of characters I could input in the appeal form and I was only able to input very few words for justification.

It took almost a month for USPS to complete the processing of my appeal. But the outcome was still not very satisfactory. USPS only refunded me \$100 out of the \$200 order. The reason they gave was “it was limited to postal insurance coverage”. This suggested that they only insured the parcel for \$100 even if my order worths \$200, which was ridiculous. Why should I pay for their oversights? I decided to appeal for the second time, but they rejected my appeal silently without notifying me and giving me justification. I was only able to find out that my appeal was rejected when I checked the status of my appeal online.

In the end, I ordered the 2024 yearly stamps again for another \$200. This time, there was still no option for me to increase the insurance coverage. I had to hope that the order would not get lost again.

Conclusions

The USPS online system is completely garbage and USPS treats the customer as if they were idiots. How would USPS like to treat the customers is completely up to them, and it is almost impossible for the customer to complain and sue USPS.

I have been encountering many missing deliveries from USPS since I came to US. Sometimes, I got great neighbors who would knock on my door and give the mis-delivered parcels or mails back to me. Sometimes, I have no idea where my parcels or mails went.

For critical deliveries, we should never ever use USPS.