Mail Theft
So a few weeks ago, I had a prescription refill coming from the mail-order pharmacy that went astray. The package was sent via USPS with tracking, so when I realized after several days that it still hadn't shown up, I was able to check the tracking and see that its status somehow changed to "forwarded" before it got lost in the system.
So I called up the pharmacy and explained that it had gotten lost in the mail, could I get a new refill? And at that point I still had almost two weeks' worth of pills left, so I had no need to go pick them up at my local pharmacy, so I just had them re-send the refill. I figured it's the mail, sometimes things go wrong, it was just a one-time glitch, right?
It was not.
So last week I'm checking the tracking for the replacement, plus a couple other packages that are coming in the mail: a book I kickstarted, part of an Amazon order, and my free COVID tests from the government.
And it happens again! The package makes its way to my local post office, get sent out for delivery, and then get returned and forwarded. And by now I can see that the first package is showing as delivered to someplace in Las Vegas. There is definitely something fishy going on.
So I got all my information organized for the different packages, and Wednesday morning, bright and early, I called the USPS customer service line. I talked to a very helpful fellow (probably in India) who said that, yes, that is very strange, and he opened up a case for it, and told me to call my local post office and also to call the office of the postal inspector. So I called the postal inspector first (since the post office wasn't open yet), and got a second case number and a promise that they would investigate.
Which I guess they did, post-haste (ha), because an hour later, after I'd had breakfast and was just getting ready to call the local post office, they called me!
And it turns out that someone had fraudulently submitted a temporary forwarding request on my behalf to have my mail forwarded!
They immediately canceled the forward once establishing that no, I had not requested that my mail be forwarded, nor had I received a confirmation postcard about it. So that's all sorted out. And the COVID tests arrived a couple days later, so I think it's resolved.
Sadly, it was too late for the other packages, whose tracking statuses I watched change to Forwarded before vanishing into the ether. But I was able to get replacements for all of it at no cost to me. I picked up the prescription from the local pharmacy after all, and the author is sending a second copy of the kickstarted book to a friend's address to pick up. And Amazon sent a replacement, although when I called them on Thursday to try to explain that it definitely would be showing up in my mailbox no matter what the tracking status was, it turned out to be much easier to just wait until it passed the second promised arrival date on Saturday, at which point they sent it with next-day delivery.
So yeah, that kinda sucked, but I guess all's well that ends well. (I did call up both the bank and the credit reporting agency and had them put flags on my accounts to watch for unusual activity, but it appears that it was only packages going missing, not normal mail. So I think it was simple theft of mail-order goods, not a prelude to attempted identity theft. But I'll keep an eye on things.)
So I called up the pharmacy and explained that it had gotten lost in the mail, could I get a new refill? And at that point I still had almost two weeks' worth of pills left, so I had no need to go pick them up at my local pharmacy, so I just had them re-send the refill. I figured it's the mail, sometimes things go wrong, it was just a one-time glitch, right?
It was not.
So last week I'm checking the tracking for the replacement, plus a couple other packages that are coming in the mail: a book I kickstarted, part of an Amazon order, and my free COVID tests from the government.
And it happens again! The package makes its way to my local post office, get sent out for delivery, and then get returned and forwarded. And by now I can see that the first package is showing as delivered to someplace in Las Vegas. There is definitely something fishy going on.
So I got all my information organized for the different packages, and Wednesday morning, bright and early, I called the USPS customer service line. I talked to a very helpful fellow (probably in India) who said that, yes, that is very strange, and he opened up a case for it, and told me to call my local post office and also to call the office of the postal inspector. So I called the postal inspector first (since the post office wasn't open yet), and got a second case number and a promise that they would investigate.
Which I guess they did, post-haste (ha), because an hour later, after I'd had breakfast and was just getting ready to call the local post office, they called me!
And it turns out that someone had fraudulently submitted a temporary forwarding request on my behalf to have my mail forwarded!
They immediately canceled the forward once establishing that no, I had not requested that my mail be forwarded, nor had I received a confirmation postcard about it. So that's all sorted out. And the COVID tests arrived a couple days later, so I think it's resolved.
Sadly, it was too late for the other packages, whose tracking statuses I watched change to Forwarded before vanishing into the ether. But I was able to get replacements for all of it at no cost to me. I picked up the prescription from the local pharmacy after all, and the author is sending a second copy of the kickstarted book to a friend's address to pick up. And Amazon sent a replacement, although when I called them on Thursday to try to explain that it definitely would be showing up in my mailbox no matter what the tracking status was, it turned out to be much easier to just wait until it passed the second promised arrival date on Saturday, at which point they sent it with next-day delivery.
So yeah, that kinda sucked, but I guess all's well that ends well. (I did call up both the bank and the credit reporting agency and had them put flags on my accounts to watch for unusual activity, but it appears that it was only packages going missing, not normal mail. So I think it was simple theft of mail-order goods, not a prelude to attempted identity theft. But I'll keep an eye on things.)