[llamanca]

We go back and forth between here and Virginia.
We do not FORWARD our mail.
We do a CHANGE OF ADDRESS and mark it as TEMPORARY and then give the starting date and ending date.
You can go online and do this or fill out a form at the post office.
I like to get the form to them about a week before I want it to start to give them time to process it.

Hope this helps. ~K

[Gunny2403]

Figure on a ten day cycle. For some reason not everything is forwarded. The USPS filters what they forward, especially if there is no “forward” stamped on outside of envelope. You will get less junk mail.

[wm_farrell]

Take a look at "Informed Delivery" by USPS. It emails you a scan of all mail arriving that day, and lists any packages. Helps be sure you don't miss anything important. Informed Delivery

[DAVES]

My two cents worth-for free
If, you can I would start it a couple of days before. We used to stop delivery when on vacation and our local post office would hold it in a box. I suspect it was a local issue
but success rate was close to zero and we would need to go to the post office and complain
to get it working.

Lost mail? If, it is lost would you know? The old comment the check must be lost in the mail. I heard it too often to count. My reply was often it is amazing the post office never loses bills only checks.

[merrymini]

The forwarding service is terrible. Tried it for awhile and gave up. My neighbor picks my mail up here and I have a home watch service in NJ that does the same there. Mostly have stuff via email, safer and faster. The postal workers here at the mail site are nasty.

[Jsbedford]

I paid for the temporary address change online at USPS, signed up for informed delivery, and introduced myself to the delivery person at Hadley. That said, I’ve had mail with my correct Villages address returned to sender, received maybe a third of the mail informed delivery told me I’d receive, and lately, the informed delivery simply states that pieces of mail that weren’t scanned may be delivered. Hmmm. We continue to receive mail from years ago previous owners even though I keep returning it and writing Please Forward, Not At This Address! They get more mail than we do!
I’ll try the tips I’ve read here next year. Forwarded mail has been a disaster this year for us.

[ddsuhr]

We find that certain mail is not forwarded, sometimes important pieces ie. Water bill from home in Maine and some financial documents. Not sure why.
Also we find it takes from 5 days to 2 weeks or more for them to be sent.
It’s not dependable

[sallyg]

We have had our mail forwarded for years. Last year was the first time we had problems. Missing bills, several weeks late delivery, and mail being delivered to northern address several weeks after our end date. Hard to believe, but it was almost as if someone had sabotaged the postal service. I think we will find someone to collect our mail in person this year.

[cj1040]

I do it often...set the start date about 7 to 10 days before you leave here.

[pjackson8]

The USPS has made recent changes and we have had several issues with forwarding mail. We now have someone empty out our mailbox for us.

[Carlsondm]

I use premium mail forwarding and have only had one glitch in two years (that I know of). They scan the front of mail so I know what is being delivered.

[cathiehines]

Originally Posted by Aruca

When I go back up North to Jersey for the summer months I’m thinking about Forwarding My Mail...are there any problems with doing this ? Will I lose mail? How long is the delayed delivery? Thanks for any advice!

I had mail forwarded from TV to Palm Harbor (100 miles). It has been a fiasco. Two very important letters are totally missing. Also, at least two letters were returned to our insurance agency as undeliverable. Thank heavens the insurance company contacted us by email. I get an email daily telling me what is coming in my mail that day.

I filed an inquiry with USPS and Jerry Collins with customer service answered telling me it was the bad weather affecting service. I told him one letter came 2/22 and the second letter on 3/10. To date I haven't received either. I responded to him telling him I had received a letter dated 3/9 so there was no reason I shouldn't have received the other two. They were not returned to the sender. I asked him to please trace the letters last week and have heard nothing. No, I would never trust them again when it comes to forwarding our mail. Heaven only knows how many pieces are actually missing.

[Marty94]

Originally Posted by thelegges

Until this month I would have said No Worries forwarding mail is not a big deal. January 1 we forwarded mail for a month from TV to MI. We don’t get bills but wanted to see how long forwarded mail takes. We have forwarded mail from here since 2010. This year is very different

Twice a week we also mailed an envelope to our home address. The forwarded mail from TV didn’t show up until 5 weeks later. 13 pieces of mail from lawn guy, pest companies, and for some reason crematoriums. Nine pieces of mail never showed, as of March 20. We have someone that lives at our north home, that takes pictures of daily mail.

Now for the twice a week envelope’s each didn’t start showing up for until 31 days later. Six are still missing. These envelopes were stamped and mailed at the local post office.

My advice for my experience would be to go paperless for every mail you can. You can always stop when you return. Then hope what mail you forwarded isn’t important or you can wait for over 5 weeks to show up

I experienced the same problems with forwarding mail. At the same time I signed up for forwarding mail, I also signed up to see my incoming mail and so I knew what letters should be forwarded and that which was junk. At Christmas, multiple cards arrived and they attached stickers “return to sender, no forwarding address” and they did in fact return them to my friends. I asked my carrier about it when I returned and she said that forwarding mail occurs at a different processing center. After several more pieces suffered the same fate and no one at USPS could help me, I decided to change my address with the sender for important mail that I cannot get electronically. Most everything else I changed to paperless.

[villagerjack]

I agree, for 14 years the problems were few but this year I am missing a lot of mail. Even mail which shows up in my “ informed delivery” in NY has nor arrived here.

[Nucky]

So as you can see there is an entire menu of mail problems. Our mail was 5 weeks behind when we move to The Villages. Sending a Birthday Card to family in Florida is an adventure and a crap shoot.

We have changed over EVERYTHING to email. The only mail we receive is advertising with car keys attached or funeral homes looking for our business.

The mail carriers in half of the Historic Section deliver the majority of Amazon packages. The mail carriers in the other half of the Historic Section don’t deliver any Amazon packages to your door. Supervision doesn’t really have a handle on the staffs activities. Good luck with your mail.