Sometimes It's Hard To Do The Right Thing

[swampratt]

I was told by a postman that if you write deceased on a letter that you get in the mail and put the flag up on the mail box the post office will take care of it and you will no longer get mail in that persons name.

I do not know about walmart though.
You may ask them if there is another address on file with that person as someone may have fat fingered the address.

 

[FRISKY]

Those might be test packages to see what your mail pick-up schedule is.

The actual scam is to scam someone else (typically with a phone call) and have them send money, money order, gift card or valuables to your address. The criminal, or someone they send, will pick it up before you get to it.

If you accidentally catch them, they will tell you the package is theirs and was delivered to your address by mistake.

To make this a double-blind scam so they don't get caught, the scam artist will pay someone to pick up packages from a bunch of different addresses. That person won't have a clue they are helping the criminals.

There are YouTube videos showing good guys tracking these people down.

 

[rickm]

It could also be someone that is planning on taking over your home cause if someone can prove they received mail at that address then they are considered a resident of the home.

 

[RETOKSQUID]

It could also be someone that is planning on taking over your home cause if someone can prove they received mail at that address then they are considered a resident of the home.

Well that's no bueno.

Every couple of months we will also get mail, and a few GrubHub deliveries for people we have never heard of addressed to our house.

 

[XYZ]

Hell, I still get an occasional piece of mail addressed to the guy we bought our house from...14 years ago!

Off topic but…..

Where I taught before I retired I regularly got mail addressed to the instructor who taught me at the same school many decades before. Talked to the guy who replaced me around December last year and he said they still send stuff for the same guy.

 

[Hooper]

Over the past week we've started getting deliveries (Walmart home delivery and USPS) for a person we've never heard of using our address.

The first two were Walmart deliveries. Both happened when we were away. They didn't amount to much...some small bottles of laundry soap and a small pack of wet-wipes. Both times I called Walmart to let them know. The first time I called the Ada store. I was told they can't/won't take the items back after they've been delivered. I asked if they had contact information for this guy and they said only an address (ours) but no phone. The second time I called the national customer service number and they told me the same thing. I got a third one last night, with a different name, but with our address again. I was able to refuse the delivery and have the driver take the package back.

We're not getting texts or emails about these deliveries.

Now we've started getting mail for this guy. I took the packages to the Francis post office and explained the issue. This is how the conversation with the lady at the PO went:

Me: We got this package. It's our address but we don't know this person.
PO: You need to take them to Ada.
Me: I'm not gonna take them to Ada.
PO: Why not?
Me: Because I don't work for the PO. You do.

She got all pissy and said she'd do something with them.

Any ideas? I've done all I know to try and locate someone with the name on the packages but nothing comes up. My wife thinks it's a possible scam but for the life of me I can't figure out how it could be. We have no unauthorized or suspicious charges at all. Our order history shows only what we've ordered.

I've heard of "brushing" scams where some merchants will order very inexpensive items and send to a false address to boost their sales numbers and so they can write positive reviews...but this doesn't really seem to fit that.

I'm figuring after not getting his orders the guy might check into the issue and correct the address mistake. But so far, that hasn't happened.

Anyway, we've tried to do the right thing with this stuff but neither Walmart nor the PO seems to care.

You might try to get in contact with a Postal Inspector. I believe they work out of the Main Terminal Post offices like OKC, LAWTON, TULSA several areas where all the mail goes for distribution to the other PO's.

Pretty sure they will straighten it out.

https://www.uspis.gov/

 

[Firpo]

I think I’d try kicking this up a couple pay-grades at Walmart. Apparently Ada is where they’re coming from?? It sounds kind of fishy in this world where a little paranoia is justified, but then what they’re generally fishing for information on you and shipping something to your address with the wrong name doesn’t really accomplish that goal.

 

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

I mean, it sounds like shenanigans, but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "master plan" would be. Of course, criminals are frequently known for making bad decisions.

Is there a local FB group for your town? There could be someone posting the obligatory "who's porch is this?" thread with photos of all their lost stuff on your porch. Maybe?

 

[KOPBET]

I've heard of people sending stuff to people they don't like and want to get even with; the story I heard was pizzas being delivered over and over again.
Don't know how to stop it tho.

Where do I sign up for the pizzas?

 

[OK Corgi Rancher]

I mean, it sounds like shenanigans, but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "master plan" would be. Of course, criminals are frequently known for making bad decisions.

Is there a local FB group for your town? There could be someone posting the obligatory "who's porch is this?" thread with photos of all their lost stuff on your porch. Maybe?

Exactly...I can't see the upside for someone to do this as a scam.

We live on a very quiet county road. Our driveway is 650' long and we keep our gate at the road locked. The first two Walmart deliveries were left by our locked gate. It's very difficult to get to our house without us knowing about it.

Neither of us does FB...but we have scanned the Francis pages but nothing is mentioned there.

My guess is it's someone new to the area that transposed some numbers in the address and it'll likely resolve itself. Nothing today...so that's positive.