I know this topic has been covered, but I figured that I would provide my thoughts on the post office shops offered by the latest MSP. For me, this is my 2nd go-round of doing post office shops for this latest MSP, and the 4th overall. The shops in my area were bonused a bit, so I figured what the heck.
Comparing the latest MSP to the previous:

1) The guidelines are very similar. You have to take a couple of extra pictures. I believe that the guidelines said to get the name of the Clerk if a name badge is being worn, but then the evaluation form didn't ask for any name. The PDF of the guidelines said that the package needs to weigh at least 1.5 pounds, but the guideline thumbnail on SASSIE said at least 1 pound, with both sets of guidelines saying that under 1 pound is unacceptable. I'm figuring that between 1 and 2 pounds is acceptable, just like with the past MSP.

2) I was annoyed at having to enter timings on multiple occasions. Why do I have to enter when I entered the line and when I arrived at the counter for service, and then enter how much time elapsed between entering the line and reaching the counter for service? Can't your program do the arithmetic? Also, why do I have to enter my entry/exit times twice? Please don't tell me that it's the way it needs to be for your program to work...write a better program!

3) The evaluation form was much cleaner for the previous MSP. Even though the questions on the evaluation form are very similar, I found that it took much longer to fill out the form for the current MSP.

Assuming that my shop is accepted, I will shop again, but only if the shops are bonused and only if the shops involve no extra driving outside of the normal distances driven on my already established routes. They aren't worth my effort for the unbonused pay, especially since I found that I spent much more time at home entering the data into the new evaluation form.

Take care everyone.

Thank you, teach. Some points had been mentioned but the way you presented the side-by-side comparison brought everything into one, concise, post.

Unless the timing can be obtained using the timer's lap function, I simply cannot do math with 60s.

These are my favorite!! I sell on ebay and when I sell I pick up post office jobs.. double win!! and yes I was def annoyed with the weight inconsistency and the extra timiings. But they are so easy that it didnt matter. lol

My biggest issue is that not only did the pay get smaller but the reimbursement did not get bigger. My family members live in zone 8 which I believe starts after only 1500 or so miles. Its a big country and especially if you live near the coast you have much less of a possible range you can mail to. Right now the required size package costs over $18 to ship to zone 8. We are one week from the end of the month and the fee plus bonus in my city is $8.
I also loathe the check in feature. This was never necessary before and I always forget!

"I also loathe the check in feature"
me to! I worry my phone will be off and the report will not be accepted because the check in time and the time I enter will not match up.

When I forget to check in, I finish the report at home on my computer. Check in is not required that way. I get annoyed with myself because I like to finish and submit on the road frequently.

@Rho wrote:

"I also loathe the check in feature"
me to! I worry my phone will be off and the report will not be accepted because the check in time and the time I enter will not match up.

Good to know. I have forgotten to check in and then did the check in later when I thought of it. I was worried but both shops I did that on passed, however I enter shops on my computer. So thanks for that tip.
And today I checked on bonuses on the aggregator website. It showed a 2 day window for the post office shop with the same $3 bonus even tho the end of the month is near. Shops could be done 1/27 or 1/28. There were only a few shops listed for me. Then I went to the website of the msc and many more shops were there. They also had a $3 bonus but could be done any day until the 31st. However it was not self assign on the msc website.

Now that you've done one, brace yourself. Their call center in the Philippines will now start calling you 6,8,13 times a day asking you to schedule more. You can try blocking their number, but they call from a spoofed pool and there is no apparent way to end it. All for $5! Its just crazy to me what Jason Naked has allowed to happen here. Boo.

It has been a few months since I did this shop and the guidelines have changed.
Now I can choose my own adventure (answer to the hazmat question). as I recall from before if I choose one of the responses they might offer to send another way. But in my city they usually put all the choices up on that little machine thing with the hazmat question written out and ground /advantage is listed there as well as all other methods. Does that constitute them offering me ground? If I see the ground price listed can I send it that way if they do not offer it to me verbally? sometimes they say nothing until I ask them about the number of days it takes think often the clerk waits for me to read it and then they may ask me part of the hazmat verbally or eventually utter the method if I pause long enough. So now asking part of the question disqualifies? Or is part of the question ok? It seems like the battery choice is the safest to get your package sent as the other choices the vague answer would mean hazmat to me if I were a clerk. Have all choices worked for you to get them to mention ground
Other questions....if they make no offer for hazmat shipping by ground, how many stamps can i buy? just one? seems like tape of another purchase may be a better choice if it is one stamp. anyone know how much you are supposed to spend max on that.?

I used to do a ton of them but since the changes and price increases, I can't get a pkg to my family for what they pay and I am not going to pay to work for them. I only do them now when a discount is better than nothing.

And if their program hasn't locked up on you yet, you are lucky! The reports take exponentially longer when the interface fails repeatedly and then they complain because your location when you checked in has somehow been overwritten in the process of restarting everything 4-6x.... Such a headache, I always want to ask them if they did ANY testing when building that crap.

@Deedeezthoughts wrote:

I used to do a ton of them but since the changes and price increases, I can't get a pkg to my family for what they pay and I am not going to pay to work for them. I only do them now when a discount is better than nothing.

And if their program hasn't locked up on you yet, you are lucky! The reports take exponentially longer when the interface fails repeatedly and then they complain because your location when you checked in has somehow been overwritten in the process of restarting everything 4-6x.... Such a headache, I always want to ask them if they did ANY testing when building that crap.

Deedeez I always do my report on my laptop. I have lost things too many times on cell phones.
There is only one time I remember losing a report on my laptop that I had to restart.

I don't believe it was the phone to blame. Questions wouldn't load even though I had a solid connection and wasn't moving. I got error messages that the site wasn't responding... That sort of thing. I went and did another shop for a different company and then finished my report after I did theirs. It was back up at that point but the geo location showed me being elsewhere. Well,.yeah... I wasn't going to sit in the PO parking lot for two hours while you reboot a server.

Just as another thought, my family lives in zone eight which is almost $4 above the reimbursement amt. But the rules for the shop I just accepted say the package, if shipped, would most likely go by Ground or Ground Advantage. That price is a bit lower so less than $2 out of pocket. I will find out today if my huge $3 bonus will cover the difference in reimbursement.

Did my shop today. While it was not the worst shop I have ever done to report on that thread it was the worst post office shop. They refused my package so I needed to purchase something. They were out of stamps, they were out of packaging stuff, they were out of tape. I stepped out of line and finally found a greeting card which was $10.59. put it back and found one for $4.59
So I waited on line twice more. The report was horrible. Not set up for not being able to ship. I was forced to put in a price for my package. 0.00 did not work. What a nightmare.

Ah, you took a HazMat shop. They are beyond ridiculous with the new MSC. The guidelines are incorrect in a few places. Fingers crossed you get paid!

@sandyf wrote:

Did my shop today. While it was not the worst shop I have ever done to report on that thread it was the worst post office shop. They refused my package so I needed to purchase something. They were out of stamps, they were out of packaging stuff, they were out of tape. I stepped out of line and finally found a greeting card which was $10.59. put it back and found one for $4.59
So I waited on line twice more. The report was horrible. Not set up for not being able to ship. I was forced to put in a price for my package. 0.00 did not work. What a nightmare.

I might be in the minority, but Hazmats are my favorite! I use the mom scenario and they typically aren't taken. I can buy a whole book of stamps and they are reimbursed. I like that I get to reuse the package, sometimes for the whole day! Then I get to do a regular shop and send off the package.

The timing bits are annoying but I'll take it. I do dislike that on the app I have to click the button to go up or down on minutes and that it won't spin or let me type it in exactly. Small inconvenience. I was denied from the previous MSC so I'm happy to be shopping them again.

I also use a regular scheduler and put it in my profile that I will only use him. He knows not to call me all the time. When I have availability for shops, I call him and then he can set me up with a route and with dates farther out than what is in the system since that only seems to be 2 or 3 days at a time.

I have been enjoying them!

@ckushner wrote:

I might be in the minority, but Hazmats are my favorite! I use the mom scenario and they typically aren't taken. I can buy a whole book of stamps and they are reimbursed. I like that I get to reuse the package, sometimes for the whole day! Then I get to do a regular shop and send off the package.

The timing bits are annoying but I'll take it. I do dislike that on the app I have to click the button to go up or down on minutes and that it won't spin or let me type it in exactly. Small inconvenience. I was denied from the previous MSC so I'm happy to be shopping them again.

I also use a regular scheduler and put it in my profile that I will only use him. He knows not to call me all the time. When I have availability for shops, I call him and then he can set me up with a route and with dates farther out than what is in the system since that only seems to be 2 or 3 days at a time.

I have been enjoying them!

Thanks for that heads up. I wrote to my scheduler a few days in advance with some questions esp what I am allowed to purchase (for instance how many stamps) but instead of answering he kept sending me the guideline email over and over. And from where I live every shop was a hazmat shop so I thought this was the only shop now. In addition they are allowed to ship by ground from what I understand if the box contains something that might explode in a plane. My clerk seemed oblivious to that. I was also wondering why I can attempt to ship to a different zip and city. There are three different other cities and zips within walking distance of my house one two blocks east, one two miles north and one two blocks west of me. . Surely they would not put those packages on an airplane to take off from the airport 3 miles from my house, land again in that same airport and then put on a truck to deliver. Makes no sense. If I do it again I will get a book of stamps. If they have stamps..

Back again. So I have done two Hazmat shops now. Both packages were rejected. One was perfume and one was laptop and they needed to know how many watts the battery was. I guess I will go back to the regular shops. I thought with Hazmat the package would go by ground which is less expensive. I actually looked it up on the post office website before I went and all scenarios are allowed by ground if you know the contents. Anyone have success sending with these? And which scenario worked for you?

All of my Hazmats have been shipped by the clerk offering ground. I use the shipping for mom scenario.

quote=sandyf]
Back again. So I have done two Hazmat shops now. Both packages were rejected. One was perfume and one was laptop and they needed to know how many watts the battery was. I guess I will go back to the regular shops. I thought with Hazmat the package would go by ground which is less expensive. I actually looked it up on the post office website before I went and all scenarios are allowed by ground if you know the contents. Anyone have success sending with these? And which scenario worked for you?[/quote]

I did some before the holidays to send gifts. It's hit or mostly miss as far as sending the package. The clerks appear to have been recently trained and most all refuse to ship the package without knowing what's inside. I used to like the Mom scenario as well, but they aren't buying it and really push to find out what's inside or just refuse to ship it.

I used to get a full book of stamps with the old company until they changed reimbursement to $2.00...urgh. I haven't tried it with the current company. ckushner..are you saying they reimburse for the entire book of stamps if you don't ship the package? Hmmm, might have to rethink these and do some more when the fee go up.

I, too, would like to know if anyone has been reimbursed for a full book of stamps. I have yet to ship with this new program because there's usually nothing in it for me. Stamps would be a plus, but not just two of them.

@jillie715 wrote:

These are my favorite!! I sell on ebay and when I sell I pick up post office jobs.. double win!! and yes I was def annoyed with the weight inconsistency and the extra timiings. But they are so easy that it didnt matter. lol

I sell on ebay too so I love these shops. As long as the item I sold is close to 1 pound, I'll sign up to use it as a post office shop. I've had to double box items to get the package over a pound but free shipping works for me since the buyer has already paid shipping plus I get reimbursed for most, if not all, of the shipping cost. I live on the west coast so sometimes I end up using some of the shipping the buyer paid but if the package is going to the east coast and a hazmat shop is available I'll use that since it's normally under the reimbursement.

What are you doing with all those stamps? I think it takes me 2 years to go through a book of stamps.

I also don't work for stamps...the shipping shops are ONLY attractive to me if I'm actually shipping something. Otherwise, $5 and stamps offer me exactly zero reason to go do one of these.

@ckushner wrote:

I might be in the minority, but Hazmats are my favorite! I use the mom scenario and they typically aren't taken. I can buy a whole book of stamps and they are reimbursed. I like that I get to reuse the package, sometimes for the whole day! Then I get to do a regular shop and send off the package.

The timing bits are annoying but I'll take it. I do dislike that on the app I have to click the button to go up or down on minutes and that it won't spin or let me type it in exactly. Small inconvenience. I was denied from the previous MSC so I'm happy to be shopping them again.

I also use a regular scheduler and put it in my profile that I will only use him. He knows not to call me all the time. When I have availability for shops, I call him and then he can set me up with a route and with dates farther out than what is in the system since that only seems to be 2 or 3 days at a time.

I have been enjoying them!

I have been thinking about what to do with lots of stamps. I still have lots of stamps left from the old company from years ago. Some of the sheets of stamps I have from them are worth more than the stamps are worth if you can sell them. I remember checking on ebay or somewhere years ago. I was planning use my Star Wars sheet of stamps to friends who love Star Wars until i saw how much those were worth. Not sure if that is possible for the books. I think most of those nice ones come in sheets. Also worth more than stamps themselves I have some pet stamps with dogs and a few others. Maybe I will start collecting those again and this time selling them.

Cassiepark, that is so true now that I think about it. I still have a boatload of stamps from the previous MSC. Sometimes if I sell something on ebay and don't have a shipping shop or if the item is too light, I use the stamps. Nothing like receiving a package with the front covered in a lovely variety of stamps..bahaaaa. I don't care, it's still mostly free shipping to me. Going back a few years, I did the Haz Mats to get almost all of the wedding stamps for my daughter-in-law for the invitations and return envelopes and thank yous. That was nice.

I sold my previous hoard of stamps at the last garage sale, except for a book or 2. Daughter might be getting married so if she goes traditional, there will be invites and thank yous to mail.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/01/2025 10:48PM by sestrahelena.

@Cassiespark wrote:

What are you doing with all those stamps?

I used to sell mine to a mailing center. Think "Mailboxes Etc"
They mark them up. So if a stamp costs 75 cents, I sold them for 50 cents, they charged their customers $1.
Everybody wins.

@Cassiespark you're an expert on predicting future events!
I got my first phone call from the MSP a couple of days ago. I shut off texts to one phone awhile back. I will have to shut off texts to the other phone that they have on file, as it started blowing up this week with texts from the MSP. My email has been hit a couple of times also with emails that were not just the normal emails that I'm used to getting. Sheesh.

@teacherguy wrote:

2) I was annoyed at having to enter timings on multiple occasions. Why do I have to enter when I entered the line and when I arrived at the counter for service, and then enter how much time elapsed between entering the line and reaching the counter for service? Can't your program do the arithmetic? Also, why do I have to enter my entry/exit times twice? Please don't tell me that it's the way it needs to be for your program to work...write a better program!

I have a free app called TimeCalc on my phone. This app allows me to add or subtract time just as easily as a regular calculator app would. It is really useful, now that ShopWatch app is no longer available for newer phones.