Snowbird mail

[JWish]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

[Shorebirds]

We used the USPS service of collecting the mail and sending to us once a week, can become a little pricy, plus we had other peoples mail sent to us, wasn't totally efficient. Now we change important addresses with individual companies, etc, and also put in a forwarding request with USPS, This seems to be the best solution for us.

[Pugchief]

The USPS is unreliable. That is not changing any time soon, probably ever.

The solution is to do everything you possibly can online. Get most of your bills by email. Set up direct deposit and direct debit and/or use billpay. This reduces your snail mail to 98% advertisements and junk.

For the remaining 2%, we forward UpNorth mail to TV when we are in FL and forward TV mail to UpNorth in the summer. It mostly works. The less important mail you get, the less of an issue it becomes.

[JWish]

The USPS is unreliable. That is not changing any time soon, probably ever.

The solution is to do everything you possibly can online. Get most of your bills by email. Set up direct deposit and direct debit and/or use billpay. This reduces your snail mail to 98% advertisements and junk.

For the remaining 2%, we forward UpNorth mail to TV when we are in FL and forward TV mail to UpNorth in the summer. It mostly works. The less important mail you get, the less of an issue it becomes.

When you say you forward the remaining 2%, is that standard USPS mail forward request? From what I read on the post office site, they don’t forward commercial advertisements, etc. Does that get you the remaining 2%, or are you changing address back and forth with each provider?

We do almost everything online, but you never know when something important will get mailed to you. I just don’t want to wait 3 months to find out! Thanks again.

[JWish]

Thank you, this is helpful!

[JWish]

We used the USPS service of collecting the mail and sending to us once a week, can become a little pricy, plus we had other peoples mail sent to us, wasn't totally efficient. Now we change important addresses with individual companies, etc, and also put in a forwarding request with USPS, This seems to be the best solution for us.

Thank you, this is helpful!

[ElDiabloJoe]

I have no firsthand experience, but I have heard a service like travellingmailbox.com has been helpful to some.Affordable Virtual Mailbox | Traveling Mailbox (https://travelingmailbox.com/pricing)

[smurphy]

We have tried to minimize the amount of mail we get by doing everything online, bot for what we can't do online we use the standard USPS forwarding. I request the forwarding at usps.com and request it start about 5 days before we leave. That way I can be sure that delivery has stopped at our house. It takes about a week before the items arrive. They only forward First class and magazines will only be forwarded about a month so you have to submit address changes with the publisher.

In order to prevent double forwarding, I stop the forwarding about a week before we return and put in a temp hold so the mail is not out in the box until we return.

I highly recommend you sign up for the free USPS Informed Delivery service. I get a daily email with pictures of the outside of every piece to be delivered. I set up an account for both houses and I know what is coming. It does take the surprise out of going to the mailbox, however.

[retiredguy123]

I would just use the USPS website and forward the mail. Three months is a long time.

[Pugchief]

When you say you forward the remaining 2%, is that standard USPS mail forward request? From what I read on the post office site, they don’t forward commercial advertisements, etc. Does that get you the remaining 2%, or are you changing address back and forth with each provider?

We do almost everything online, but you never know when something important will get mailed to you. I just don’t want to wait 3 months to find out! Thanks again.

Correct. Standard forwarding service. The junk mail and ads don't come, only first class mail. It costs $1.10 to set up each time, and the maximum duration is 6 months.

[asianthree]

We no longer get any mail that’s important, everything is online. We did forward one year, and multiple things got lost. It’s not worth the grief.

Our granddaughter stops once a week, at our northern home, opens anything important and sends a pic. The rest she shreds.

Pay a neighbor it’s worth it and safer.

[Velvet]

Same. I get stuff online. Bills etc. I can’t remember the last time I used the postal service for anything other than packages.

[tophcfa]

The USPS is unreliable. That is not changing any time soon, probably ever.

The solution is to do everything you possibly can online. Get most of your bills by email. Set up direct deposit and direct debit and/or use billpay. This reduces your snail mail to 98% advertisements and junk.

For the remaining 2%, we forward UpNorth mail to TV when we are in FL and forward TV mail to UpNorth in the summer. It mostly works. The less important mail you get, the less of an issue it becomes.

We do the exact same thing, except we simply put our mail on hold for the whole winter, and early spring, and deal with the remaining 2% when we return. Only once we got a small penalty for late payment of a bill, our quarterly property tax bill up north. Our small hill towns archaic website doesn’t allow setting up autopay, so now I call the tax accessors office from the Villages and get the bill information and send them a check from the Villages during the winter. The post office is only supposed to hold the mail for thirty days, but an annual box of chocolates for the women working in our small towns post office solves that problem.

[dewilson58]

We used USPS for years and they did a great job.

No issues.

[GoRedSox!]

We did put a forwarding order in up north, and then canceled it a week before we left The Villages. We found out that the only post office we could do that at in The Villages was way up north near Spanish Springs in Lady Lake I think.

We get a lot of mail up north, and most of it is junk mail. I'm not sure what happens to the mail, but the stuff that shows up in FL does not have all that junk mail in it. We did get everything that could be considered important.

We don't get much junk mail at all at our Villages address. I'm not sure why.

[CarlR33]

Adding a mail service will not get you any more than forwarding (with a cost) because you will be forwarding to a paid PO Box then having it mailed to you? Just have the rest of your non issue stuff forwarded to TV via USPS and sign up for their informed delivery service which they will scan your mail each day and forward pictures early in the morning via email before the mail even comes. If you’re forwarding the mail then it will be a few days delayed from the picture email. If you do a complete mail hold you will see the informed delivery and not be getting the mail until you get home. The forwarding as well as the informed delivery can all be done online once you create an account, etc.
Informed Delivery - Mail & Package Notifications | USPS (https://www.usps.com/manage/informed-delivery.htm)

[Pugchief]

We used USPS for years and they did a great job.

No issues.

There's an exception to every rule.

[Velvet]

Yes, I don’t have any issues either, because there is nothing (that I’d like to see) to deliver. There is a nice sense of being invisible… but some people still insist on sending greeting cards…

[SIRE1]

We've been snowbirds for 10 years now, so I have had a lot of experience in receiving mail. In reading previous post to your question, I agree with most of the responses, but feel there are a couple more things that you should consider.

First, we use the Post Office website to submit a mail forwarding request, both for when we come to Florida and when we go back to our northern home. This will cover a lot of the miscellaneous and is a good idea. But remember, there is usually about a 7 - 14 day delay so don't rely on it to get bills delivered to you before the due date. Also remember that certain types of mail does not get forwarded, including some income tax statements, replacement credit cards, magazines, etc. And even if you have signed up for informed delivery notification, the mail doesn't get to you any faster or get delivered if it is one of those "special" types of mail. And it makes sure that personal mail (e.g. birthday cards, specials announcements, etc) gets delivered while you are here in Florida.

So once we learned of those limitations, in addition to requesting USPS forwarding, we went with paperless email delivery of many of the sources that would be sending us mail and a regular basis. That ensured we would promptly get bills and statements where ever we happened to be.

And then, for many of those cases where we chose not to have email delivery, we went onto the companies website and changed the address in our user profile so that the mail is sent directly to where ever we are at (i.e. our Villages address or our Michigan address). That included banking, credit cards, income tax information sources, and magazines that we want to receive. That way, the mail is directed to our current residence and is not forwarded, and we get it promptly (or as promptly as the US Mail service can provide). Plus we will receive mail that is not eligible for forwarding. Also, remember that magazines are only forwarded for a couple of months, so changing our profile mailing address allows us to continue receiving those publications.

Finally, when you get ready to head either down to Florida or back home, consider the lead time required for mail that is in the pipeline to be received. That includes both when forwarding should end and when the profile address should be changed. It sometime takes almost 2 weeks to clear that pipeline.

Hope that helps answer some of your mail forwarding questions.

[moret5107]

If you plan to be in Florida i January , Feb or March, please remember that all your 1099's are in the USPS system for tax purposes. Would recommend that you set up temporary forwarding at your local post office.

[Relias]

We always do a temporary address change both ways as stated above. Make sure you go directly to USPS on their website. It is a $1.10 charge on your credit card. There are some bogus sites out there who will try to say they are it…I believe a $35 charge. The postal service doesn’t do that! I hope this helps!

[Ellwoodrick]

I agree with Sire1, my wife and I learned the hard way about the forwarding of Bank & Tax Docs. It does not happen. When we are gone we have a friend pick up the mail and resend it to our address down in the Villages. I give him money for postage and his trouble. Just not worth loosing important docs the other way.

[TheWatcher]

I would just use the USPS website and forward the mail. Three months is a long time.

Recommend doing forward and hold requests in person at the post office. We have had multiple problems doing it online over the past 2 years. Even the postal employees recommened to do it at the post office to limit problems.

[Papa_lecki]

I agree with Sire1, my wife and I learned the hard way about the forwarding of Bank & Tax Docs. It does not happen. When we are gone we have a friend pick up the mail and resend it to our address down in the Villages. I give him money for postage and his trouble. Just not worth loosing important docs the other way.

We tried 2 things.
One year i created a number of priority mail envelopes and asked a friend to check on the house in the north every week, get the mail and throw it in the priority mail envelope. That worked okay, just didnt like bothering the friend year after year.
Next two years did the service where the USPS gathers your mail for a week and sends it to you. Year 1, we had some hickups, some mail didnt get forwarded until I called post office.
Second, year, it worked GREAT.

[bowlingal]

have friends or family overnight your mail from your northern home to here once a week

[Susan1717]

I have as much set up paperless as possible and get everything online through emails, and automatic pay. I have my Mail set up to where I receive a daily email that shows a picture of what got delivered. I just let it all gather up north and then if I have something, I think it’s very important or need. I have a friend that will go and retrieve it for me. She lives very close and I always give her a nice gift card as a thank you

[bionorse1]

We have had our mail forwarded for many years without any problems. Subscribe to Informed Delivery for free on USPS and you can see what mail you are getting everyday when you are home and when you are in TV you'll see what's on its way.

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks![/QUOTE]

[Papa_lecki]

Recommend doing forward and hold requests in person at the post office. We have had multiple problems doing it online over the past 2 years. Even the postal employees recommened to do it at the post office to limit problems.

That’s my experience, go to your local post office.

[MrFlorida]

Important stuff online, the USPS is not what it used to be.

[jcreason5616]

Informed Delivery is great!

[Whoaboy]

When you say you forward the remaining 2%, is that standard USPS mail forward request? From what I read on the post office site, they don’t forward commercial advertisements, etc. Does that get you the remaining 2%, or are you changing address back and forth with each provider?

We do almost everything online, but you never know when something important will get mailed to you. I just don’t want to wait 3 months to find out! Thanks again.

I used the informed delivery online which sends you a picture of your mail everyday. Then I had the neighbor open it for me if I needed to see it. Otherwise she just collected it for me for 3 months till I got home. By then I had a ton of junk to throw away but the system worked.

[Latora]

I go back and forth between my home in GA and The Villages. We mostly get junk mail in TV. I do occasionally get cards or personal mail in TV. I have been told by the postal worker that if mail is not picked up in ten days, the mail is removed from the box. People who have mailed cards said the cards were never returned to sender. This has happened on four occasions. Where do these items end up? What if they contained a check or gift card.

[DrHitch]

...I have heard a service like travellingmailbox.com has been helpful to some.

I did look at this company's website.... They open your mail and scan things and send them to you in email... No thank you!

Just get as much of your mail done electronically and get the USPS informed delivery service.

[nn0wheremann]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!
If you forward your mail the postal service will notify your billers, who will notify the credit bureaus, and any state or local governments also will be notified of your change of address. These will affect your legal residency, and credit history.

[Bob45]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

We've had the post office forward our mail for the last 10 years. Never a problem. Only thing is, it's delayed a few days.

[BadgerRed]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

We have our mail forwarded to a mail service. USPS does not forward the “junk/bulk rate” mail, so what our service gets is the first class mail. We also have informed delivery with USPS so we see what is coming to our home address. It can take up to 2 weeks for mail to reach our service. Once they get it, they send us a picture of the envelope. I usually wait until they have several pieces or see something I need. Then i have the service send it to me by 2 day FedEx. It works for us.

[BoneLakeBennie]

If you forward your mail the postal service will notify your billers, who will notify the credit bureaus, and any state or local governments also will be notified of your change of address. These will affect your legal residency, and credit history.

Perhaps if you request a permanent address change, but not for a temporary address change.

[YoRomeo]

I am snowbird and I have been using the USPS forwarding mail service for all of those years. I am never had a problem. Nothing is perfect, but filling out the form online or going to the post office for a form is simple. Guarantees that you will not miss any mail that might be import.

[jacRI]

Also start your forward and return dates 10 days prior to arrival and departure.

[kendi]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

We used to forward but because that was not reliable now we just have someone get our mail for us. We have informed delivery do we know what we’re getting.

[kendi]

I go back and forth between my home in GA and The Villages. We mostly get junk mail in TV. I do occasionally get cards or personal mail in TV. I have been told by the postal worker that if mail is not picked up in ten days, the mail is removed from the box. People who have mailed cards said the cards were never returned to sender. This has happened on four occasions. Where do these items end up? What if they contained a check or gift card.

I don’t know but we just let the guy who works at our mailboxes in TV know we’ll be gone and he holds it for us. Nothing gets lost.

[Professor]

I have tried several options. USPS is not reliable for forwarding. It is hit and miss and they won't forward something from a government agency that has "Do Not Forward" on it...and, as it turns out,that is usually the important stuff typically. I have a friendly neighbor who lives full time in The Villages who offered to pick up my mail once a week (I have both a PO Box and the Villages mailbox) and mail it to me at whatever interval I want. I gave her $200 cash for the postage, and every two weeks she sends it priority and she keeps the junk stuff until I return.

About 3 years ago I signed up for USPS Informed Delivery for both my addresses (PO Box and Villages) so I get a daily email with a picture of the front on each piece of mail (mostly anyway) so I can keep track of what is arriving. If something really important comes in I can text my neighbor to be watching for it. The USPS service is free.

The Villages is home for me but I spend 4 months a year up North visiting family and I keep a small condo there so I have my own place. It has worked very well, but you do need someone trustworthy like my neighbor (I have known her and her spouse for 10 + years) to handle it. This has been the most satisfactory arrangement I have found. I get no mail delivered to the condo up North, and yes, I do take my neighbor out for a nice meal occasionally to pay her back for her efforts.

[Nell57]

The USPS is unreliable. That is not changing any time soon, probably ever.

The solution is to do everything you possibly can online. Get most of your bills by email. Set up direct deposit and direct debit and/or use billpay. This reduces your snail mail to 98% advertisements and junk.

For the remaining 2%, we forward UpNorth mail to TV when we are in FL and forward TV mail to UpNorth in the summer. It mostly works. The less important mail you get, the less of an issue it becomes.

This is excellent advice and exactly what I’ve done for more than 10 years.
I would add two additional comments.
Make sure you start the MAIL FORWARD a week in advance. That way you can see that they are no longer delivering to your current address while you are still in town. The forwarded mail arrives at your new address about the same time you do.
Set up INFORMED DELIVERY with USPS for your permanent address. In your email you will receive daily pictures of what has been sent to that address. For me, it’s 95% junk mail, because I do all financials on line. The junk mail does not get forwarded. For the 5% of my mail that matters, I can monitor that it safely gets forwarded to me .
You can work this way with USPS, or with a private mail service as was mentioned. Either way, it’s only as successful as the human being who is actually handling your mail.

[Larry P.]

We have tried to minimize the amount of mail we get by doing everything online, bot for what we can't do online we use the standard USPS forwarding. I request the forwarding at usps.com and request it start about 5 days before we leave. That way I can be sure that delivery has stopped at our house. It takes about a week before the items arrive. They only forward First class and magazines will only be forwarded about a month so you have to submit address changes with the publisher.

In order to prevent double forwarding, I stop the forwarding about a week before we return and put in a temp hold so the mail is not out in the box until we return.

I highly recommend you sign up for the free USPS Informed Delivery service. I get a daily email with pictures of the outside of every piece to be delivered. I set up an account for both houses and I know what is coming. It does take the surprise out of going to the mailbox, however.

This is exactly how we do it and it works very well. There is a little lag time but we receive most of our monthly bills electronically anyway. Ironically the two that we don't get paperless are Citizens First Bank and our monthly Amenity bill.

[Nell57]

Perhaps if you request a permanent address change, but not for a temporary address change.

Be cautious about doing that.
Some states notify your board of elections and cancel your voter registration. (FL-OH)

[Nell57]

If you forward your mail the postal service will notify your billers, who will notify the credit bureaus, and any state or local governments also will be notified of your change of address. These will affect your legal residency, and credit history.

That applies if you mark the box PERMANENT ADDRESS CHANGE.
If you mark TEMPORARY MOVE they will forward it for up to six months.

[Nell57]

I am snowbird and I have been using the USPS forwarding mail service for all of those years. I am never had a problem. Nothing is perfect, but filling out the form online or going to the post office for a form is simple. Guarantees that you will not miss any mail that might be import.

As of 2024 you have to do the address change at your local USPS and show ID .
They had too many problems with people doing it online….some scammers figured out how to change other peoples addresses.

[DonnaSt]

We have been snowbirds twice. Both times we found that forwarding mail through USPS works for the most part but can be very delayed. It might show up on your USPS informed but it might not be in the mailbox for several days or even weeks. Our biggest concern was at tax time. This year we are getting a PO Box . Hopefully this will be a smoother process.

[Jalane]

The person at our CBU (cluster box unit) in TV told me that they don't receive the online hold/forward info for 1-2 weeks, if at all. I was told to pick up the yellow hold cards at the post office in WW or LL and then put it in the slot at the CBU so they get it. They tape it over the mail slot for your box so they see it when distributing the mail.

As far as the Informed Delivery email - that worked great when we were in IL. Every piece of mail was scanned and in the email. Here, however, we typically get an email every day with 2 pieces of mail scanned, but get more mail that was not scanned.

[Mburg1368]

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. 😄

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

They only forward 1st class mail. So if you have magazine subscriptions, they end up in the garbage.

[smurphy]

This is exactly how we do it and it works very well. There is a little lag time but we receive most of our monthly bills electronically anyway. Ironically the two that we don't get paperless are Citizens First Bank and our monthly Amenity bill.

You can go paperless for your Amenity (Utility) bill. Call the customer service number on your bill and they can set it up for you.

[Emkay56]

I do a temporary change of address and have all our mail forwarded to FL when we are there. I also sign up for informed delivery so I get an email everyday showing me what's coming in the mail. It's very reliable.

We have been staying in our TV home for a few weeks off and on for the last few years but are planning to stay for 3 months this winter. ������

Should we just have the post office forward our mail for those months? How reliable is it, and do you always get your important mail?

Would it be better to have a mail service receive our mail then forward what we want?

How do other snowbirds manage their mail for long stays?

Thanks!

[MikeVillages]

I didn't read all the replies so maybe someone already stated this.

The USPS will temporary do an change of address for upto 6 months then automatically change it back. You can do this in the change if address section on the USPS website. They charge about $1.00 on a credit card to verify you are you.

PS
If you go back sooner then expected, you can change the return date also on the internet.

[jack_pine]

Totaly disagree about the USPS premium forwarding. It iis pricey but we get our mail delivered once a week. It has been flawless for us. Have used it for many years.