Postal Service Update

august 27, 2025– Michael Marsh

In 2022 we talked about our sometimes 'too quick to blame' the U.S. Postal Service for delayed or non-delivered mail. We concluded that "We are still laughing at how silly our complaints about "the mail system" were when the actual situation was caused by the sender or their external mail contractor." In the situation with the piece of mail below, there is no 'too quick to blame'.

In our workers' compensation claims unit in Montana, 100% of our payments are sent hard copy through the mail; Indemnity payments to workers for lost wage benefits, Medical payments to providers and hospitals and a slew of nearly 1,000 external service providers and vendors. Since the roll out of the pandemic in 2020, staff has seen a marked increase in undelivered, lost and delayed mail. Where there was one or two lost payments per year prior to the pandemic, we have had many, many more. Hardly a week goes by without a payee recipient calling for payment status...where the check was previously mailed.

It's human nature I guess to complain about "those people at the Post Office". Right? Easier to assume the cause and complain that look closer and find the actual genesis of the issue. We teach our new staff and try our best to live the motto "INVESTIGATION.COMMUNICATION.RESOLUTION.®" in our claims handling activities. Even we this year however have been caught up in the 'blame the Post Office' routine. But this situation gave power to the Post Office detractors.

Returned Mail Received 8/27/2025                   Original Letter Sent 1/12/2022

There are outlier examples everywhere. The point here is to not simply dismiss or discount someone because they claim to have not received a letter or payment from your office or mailing center. As will all things claims, do an unbiased, open minded, open eyes investigation into the facts.  In this case, the attorney was so right, they had not received the letter.

No one received the letter...until it was returned to our office as undeliverable 3 years and 8 months after it was originally mailed.

Takeaway: Identical message as our last observation in 2022. It is important to investigate claims and all situations in life. Even the small stuff should not be subjected to assumptions...without a little digging and questioning you might not ever know if it was the Postal Service or the Sender...or the cause of the injury.