Is USPS Tracking Useless?

It isn’t really “tracking.” It’s more or less just “delivery confirmation.” It just indicates whether or not the parcel was delivered. They do not provide real-time tracking. So the track and confirm title is a little misleading.

Very rarely, on a few packages, I’ve seen actual updates where a parcel was scanned at some location. This is very rare, and is hardly considered real-time tracking. Usually the scan is at the arrival city post office immediately before delivery to the final address.

We order some plants mail order this spring and they came via USPS but they had a UPS looking label on them with the tracking number starting “1Z” UPS ground service. To find out UPS and USPS partner for some shipping clients that UPS actual ships the package to a local post office for the post office to deliver the last mile. I suspect these packages would have the tracking you are accustomed to. I for fun just tracked it via google with the tracking number in the search box so it found the UPS tracking + the final delivery by the post office.

I cannot wait until the USPS totally disappears to have UPS and FED to take over the rest of their business. The time I use USPS is when I have to mail a simple and plain letter! I cut all my business from the USPS: PACKAGES, OVERSEES DELIVERIES ETC ETC. The USPS IS PATHETIC! AND useless when you need such services. I’m glad I do all my billing on line. Save a lot money every month. I believe other Companies should have the change to have regular home mail delivery OPPORTUNITIES , and then you’ll see how BAD really THEY (USPS)ARE!!

Sun that does not look like any kind of USPS tracking number (delivery confirmation, signature confirmation, insurance, registered or certified mail). It looks like a reference number for DHL smart mail or Fedex smart post. If that is how your order was shipped it generally takes 2-6 weeks (it is incredibly slow and companies use it to save some money on shipping but you have to bee a really high volume shipper to see real savings).

As for delivery confirmation it does provide actual tracking a lot of the time. I ship hundreds of packages a week as part of my business and receive scans at the local sorting facility on most of my packages (west Sacramento or Marysville). USPS is supposed to be installing automated scanners at most of their sorting facilities so if your local sorting facility has the scanners you should see scans on most of your packages.

USPS gets double or even triple the packages UPS and FEDEX gets daily they would have to pull off every single package off the pallets and scan them that means it would take that much longer to get your package. That’s why USPS don’t do real time tracking.

We see a lot of extreme comments. As usual, both extreme sides are wrong.

The USPS delivers excellent value in general. The sorting and transport network is top-notch, and the delivery network is also reasonably good. The biggest problem is poor customer service at the retail level. This also happens to be where many consumers interact with them, and really stains their overall reputation.

The USPS gets far greater volume of *mail* than UPS or Fedex, but it gets fewer *packages* than even just UPS alone. It’s more a matter of the infrastructure not having been designed for tracking. It’s always harder to retrofit something onto a proces than to have it built in.

As one commenter mentioned, this is changing. They now have automated scanning and sorting machines for parcels as well as letters and flats. (Incidentally, this is why the electronic DC barcodes recently had the ZIP code prepended — so that the machine can sort by reading the DC barcode, rather than having to use the POSTNET barcode.)

When this is rolled out nationwide, we will get sort-level intermediate progress reports. This means at least three scans: at the induction sort center, at the destination sort center, and (hopefully) by the mail carrier at the end. I already get this on about 80% of my packages, because I live in a metropolitan area and because most shipping warehouses are also located near big USPS sort centers.

UPS-style tracking (”my package just passed through some small town in Nebraska!”) will have to wait until the postal service can get better visibility into the transportation process, which is contracted out.

its usps’s network and scanners, i work at one of their stc’s sorting centers as a contractor and postal is always complaning about our scanning numbers, i work on the dock and unload big boxes full of bubble packs and priority boxes and usps fill the boxes and then scans each package into a placard say its going to california zip range 900-904 but a majority of packages and letter trays come in not placard assign wich renders tracking useless as per one of the postal reps they are planning on fixing this to where tracking will be better to keep up with ups and fedex. as for our side postal has tested this so they know we can unload a box of priority mail unload scan it, stage scan and load scan onto the departing truck and check the status of the conainer and it will say no status so when you order something and get a tracking number know that it is moving, all priority mail makes it onto the truck truck loads as follows registered mail, express, priority, first class dated, first class non dated, then hazmat, if you order batterys or something else hazmat qualified it can get bump of a truck and wait for the next trip to make room for other mail types. usually no package stops anywhere unless something happens to the contractor truck or when they switch out trailers with other drivers to complete the trip, imo they need to ditch the scanner system they have now and find a more reliable one

It’s not the USPS “track & confirm” site, it’s the workers, who have to scan the items. Anyways, a lot of the time it does work, as I ALWAYS ship my packages with them (& usually receive), it’s always been cheaper and faster for me. I hope weekend deliveries never stop.

Label/Receipt Number: *******

Delivery status information is not available for your item via this web site.

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