Posted on 04/02/2025 7:11:14 AM PDT by Pol-92064
At the Remote Encoding Center in Salt Lake City, keyers process 1.2 billion images of mail every year. It's a more difficult job than I thought.
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
I worked with my 9 year old grandson on his spelling words yesterday.
His h’s, r’s and n’s are impossible to differentiate.
He has problems with a few other letters as well.
I would love to see one of these machines or workers could make out his hand writing.
I assume the system uses a large database comprising individual handwritten character/word samples.
Then it is sort of a high tech Wheel of Fortune sans Vanna White to figure out the rest. Ulimately, some may have to be routed to a human.
It’s fun/fashionable/annoying to rip the USPS for myriad reasons. I’ve had bones to pick with them occasionally, including a couple of specific incidents that really infuriated me.
But the bottom line is, they have delivered approximately 2000 DVDs I’ve sold over the years without a single complaint from a buyer for non-delivery. There was one buyer who complained of damage, but his description of the damage was very suspicious, and he wouldn’t send a picture to document it. I think he was running a con to get a second DVD for free. It worked. I didn’t have much choice...
Way back around 1970, I received a small plastic bag containing a rumpled, charred and water-damaged envelope, with the explanation that it was part of a mail shipment recoverd from a plane crash at the Toledo Express airport.
USPS, you ain’t perfect, but you have mostly done well for me.
I think that the USPS does a very good job with first class mail. The problem is all the junk mail that comes through it which must be costing the senders very little or they would not use USPS.
A second problem is the incredibly favorable postage rates given to items from China. These low prices are left from when China was literally a starving country. Congress needs to end this completely unfair policy.
Yep, in general the usps delivers just fine. It’s the overall COST that is the problem.
IIRC, the USPS deserves kudos for developing ICR (the handwriting version of OCR that reads print).
Just don’t try the broken stereo scam. If you get a package with no return address let Uncle Leo open it instead. What could go wrong?
(handwriting version of OCR that reads print)
Elsewhere it certainly doesn’t work very well....but I won’t divulge where (for various security reasons)
Their OCR is very good. Lockheed Martin’s Federal Systems Group provides the RCR (Remote Computer Reader) technology.
What wasn’t explained is, after the remote operator keys in the correct information, a barcode is applied to the back of the mail piece so it can be machine sorted from that point on. So when you get one of those, you’ll know why.
Generally good, yes. But there is a significant reduction in timing of deliveries last few years.
Monthly we get a package from the Midwest to FL. Usually shipped on Friday or Saturday in a Priority Envelope. Normally we get it Monday or Tuesday.
This month it was mailed on Friday. It went the wrong direction for about 4 days and sat there. Finally arrived on Monday 9 days after shipped. There should be a partial refund when their 2-3 day goal is blown to hell.
I do remember in college (1970s) I was an engineering student and was very very good at lettering. I addressed an envelope home with perfect block lettering. A few days later it came back as undeliverable. I was heading home the next week and brought to the post office and asked what made it undeliverable. They had no excuse. I asked for a refund. That was a hard “no.”
And, in my experience, with First Class Packages, now called something else.
Your point about cheap rates for China is well-taken. Dirt cheap for them to send it here, but if you ever have to return something at your own expense to prove it’s defective, you’re screwed. Costs more than the item is worth, and there’s no proof of delivery.
“Sorry, customer. Can’t refund your purchase price because you didn’t return the product.”
Interesting...
..
Did you price them individually ?
Some are hard to find or collectable.
Thru eBay perhaps?
Swap meet usually a buck each.
I’ve got about 1200 I need Gone !
.
I think I could trim it to 200 or so.
I’ve given a few to Goodwill which sells
them for a buck and change.
.
USPS is okay but nerve-wracking at times.
.
Thanks
I received a package early this month from Amazon that I ordered December 6th and it had been lost.
It had never showed …I chose a refund.
I tried to return it by online discussion with a computerized service rep and it told me it was not necessary to return it…because I had already received the refund.
I gave up.
Have not been charged…yet.
A pair of shoes and some work gloves.
$90 package.
I feel guilty.
You used the correct term, "lettering".
I was an architecture student who had taken numerous drafting classes in junior high and in high school, and then in my first year at USC--so by then I was pretty confident in my lettering expertise. But that summer I got a job as a draftsman with the US Army Corps of Engineers. My new boss took one look at my lettering and immediately assigned me to remedial lessons, so that my lettering would lose its idiosyncrasies and resemble everyone else's. No prima donnas!
NY to MN mailed 3/15/25 still not even half way here. Computer printed label.
the post office is broken.
bump
I worked at the USPS Bulk Mail Facility in Phx for 2 years long ago.
Newman is not far off.
But overall, considering the volume the USPS handles, most letters and packages arrive at their destination.
On piece of advise though from my father who worked at the Post Office: Never send a package uninsured - too many thieves in the system.
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