A Strange Experience
Written 9-25-96
A few years ago I went on a trip to the Pacific Northwest. Since I would be gone for 17 days, I stopped my mail. Never having had trouble with this, I felt completely worry-free about this aspect of my getting ready.
Upon returning, I picked up my mail at the Post Office. To my surprise, two checks which I had expected during the time I was gone, were missing. All the rest of my mail was there, --tons of junk mail and all. I called the Post Office twice and stopped in twice about these missing checks. Always I received the same reply. "No, we haven't located your checks." So I started the tedious procedure of notifying the people in charge. After much corresponding and red tape, new checks were issued to me.
Probably about 3 weeks later, I received a call from the Post Office that they had located my checks. They had found them on a shelf above the place where the mail was sorted. So I picked them up and returned them to the proper places, as by this time I had received the re-issued checks, cashed them, and spent them.
In my mind, I questioned this, and wondered why just those two pieces of mail were misplaced. In the days following, there was an article in the Record Herald saying that a postal employee had been caught embezzling checks. But these were all veteran's checks. I figured that since I was not a veteran, my checks were probably put up on the shelf and not discovered until later.
After that experience, I put my checks on direct deposit in the bank, so I need not worry about that aspect any more.