You Can't Do That

It's been awhile since I've gone into a post office branch to obtain a cancellation and was greeted with the response, "Can't do that. Your envelope must be addressed and you must drop them into the mail here. How do I know you're not trying to use it to show that you've mailed something when you really haven't?"

There are two Contract Postal Units, both in local banks, in Plattsburgh, NY. I hadn't been in either in a few years, so I stopped by to see what I could find in terms of cancels. Actually, the bank clerks at both were very polite and helpful. After calling the main post office and explaining the situation, the clerk even let me cancel my own covers so I would get good examples.

Nice cancels!

Let me see. How does the fact that I have an envelope prove that I mailed it to someone else? Wouldn't THEY have the envelope if I mailed it?

More clear thinking from the postal service. Why didn't the clerk just day "I don't want to do it"?

There are countless reasons if you think about it - fabricating evidence is one. Or how about this - if you don't file your tax returns by a certain day, you incur a fine. Knowing you're going to be a couple of days late, you get the envelope postmarked, take it home, then hand deliver it late, but with a postmark 'proving' you sent it on time.

I'm not about to hand deliver my Federal tax return. The fine for being late would be less than the cost of the trip to the other side of the country (I'm in AR, and I think I sent it to CA this year) and back. This might work for some local shenanigans, however.

But the postal regs permit handbacks for philatelic purposes. A postal clerk who says "I cannot do that" doesn't know the regs.

The point is that the USPS has policies in their Postal Operations Manual that clearly allow for what is referred to as "handback service". If a postal clerk doesn't cooperate, that's another thing. It's a violation of USPS policy when a postal clerk doesn't comply with the regulations, but the clerk's don't care and the more you press them about it, the more they refuse to cooperate. It's much easier to find a post office with a cooperative postal clerk:

(1) The person was not a USPS employee, but a bank clerk/teller. I don't think you can expect them to have to know all the nuances of the Postal Operations manuel.

(2) CPUs employees cannot be USPS employees.

There was a time in my life when I worked in a small local market and one of the things we had to offer was postal services along with stamps etc. I was never trained but we were given a manual to look things up.

I had a refusal to post mark some covers on July 3rd in Yazoo City, MS. I even purchased a sheet of stamps there. I asked for the postmaster but they said! He was not there.

I didn't know you can do that. It makes an interesting new thing to think about collecting.