Is your mailbox often graced with the mail of the previous tenants of your home or apartment? Here’s how to get that misdirected mail out of your mailbox.
Forwarded mail sometimes slips through the cracks, and it only lasts for a certain amount of time. If the previous tenant didn’t change her address directly with a company, that mail is going to keep coming to the address on file.
There are a few things you can do to try to stop someone else’s mail from being delivered to your mailbox. If one doesn’t work, try the next. There’s no one guaranteed way, though—it often depends on your post office and carriers.
Return to Sender
Return to Sender is the best way to notify the party sending the misaddressed mail of their mistake. The idea behind writing “return to sender” on mail addressed to someone who no longer lives at your address isn’t that the post office will stop delivering it, but that the sender gets it back and removes your address from their system. This doesn’t always work, but it’s worth a shot.
You can write “return to sender” or “no longer at this address.” If you cross off the barcode, automated systems alert someone to look at the mail and, hopefully, see it’s being delivered to the wrong address.
Of course, when you place the mail back in your box, your carrier should see your note. With any luck, he’ll get the hint and stop delivering mail addressed to that name to your home. Carriers serve many homes, though, so it can be easy for them to forget.
If you’re tired of carrying all this mail inside only to have to carry it right back out again, you can Velcro a pen inside your mailbox. This makes it easier to write your note and leave the mail right there.
If you’re dealing with a serious deluge of mail, you might want to use a big, clear, red ink stamp to whiz through the pile.
Make a Sign
The postal service often puts a note inside mailboxes with the last names of the people who receive mail at that address. Carriers don’t always check those when they toss presorted mail into the box, though.
