Community Forums

Bobb.25 · 12-31-2011, 02:35 PM

Wife and I will experience our first snowbird trip to Florida in about a month.
We plan to stay for about two months. I receive and pay all major bills electronically. However, there is still a lot of miscellaneous mail including magazines. The Post office says they will not hold for more than a month. What is the best way to get this stuff forwarded to where we'll be in Florida ?

Bob

BarbRN · 12-31-2011, 02:41 PM

I have the same question for a three month trip. Hope we get some replies.

Tsronco · 12-31-2011, 03:21 PM

We are currently snow birding in AZ from NJ what we did was put a temporary forwarding address (the campgrounds) so all our mail is forwarded here to us

If I rennet correctly the form was a change of address form and we had to mark "temporary" and include a date which we want our mail to resume at our home address

Gary RVRoamer · 12-31-2011, 04:37 PM

If the campground accepts mail for residents, just have it forwarded there (but they have a limit of magazine forwarding too). If they don't, you might have the mail forwarded to a private mail handling service (what the P.O. calls a PMB) such as a UPS store or FMCA and let them hold and re-send to you as needed.

jzick · 12-31-2011, 05:34 PM

If you are going to stay in one place, and where you are staying will accept mail just do a temporary forward with the USPS. Be very careful that the forward is done correctly - about half the time we do this the forward is messed up at the local post office. I have learned to go stand in line and do it in person, making sure the entries are made correctly. Check the rules for forwarding magazines - I think they are only sent for one month. If you are going to change locations, I would suggest you find a mail forwarder. We use a UPS store.

dapiglet · 01-01-2012, 03:37 PM

magazines = 60 days for USPS Fowarding

mhs4771 · 01-01-2012, 07:36 PM

Check with your local PO, yes they say they will hold for only 30 days, but some will hold longer. They recently held ours for 3 months as we didn't know exactly when we would return. Now for the winter we went the Temp Change of Address to the Resort we're at. For a short period, using a Mail Forwarding Company would be a real PITA because you would have to change everything or have the PO forward it. If you were moving from place to place every couple of weeks the Temp Change of Address would work, then the Mail Forwarding Co would be an option if you could get a friend or relative to collect you mail and send it to you.

BarbRN · 01-18-2012, 06:51 AM

Since we will not be staying anyplace long for 3 months, I contacted Escapees Mail service. They want over $100 for the 3 months including postage. Seems like a lot of money. Is there anybody else you can recommend?

Geezer80 · 01-18-2012, 07:19 AM

Prior to buying an RV, we lived aboard our sailboat (fulltime) for 5+ years. We sailed from Maine to the southern Bahamas. We were referred to St. Brendan's Isle, Green Cove Springs. When we wanted our mail shipped, they got it to us. They are very good at what they do, reasonably priced, and offer a number of services.

https://www.sbimailservice.com

LindaH · 01-18-2012, 07:52 AM

If you are going to be in one place during your stay (as opposed to moving from place to place), the USPS has a forwarding service called Premium Forwarding Service where they will send out all the mail accumulated in one Priority Mail envelope once a week. This includes magazines, so if you use this service, there will be no 2 month limit on the forwarding of magazines.

It's not inexpensive though, but for a two-month stay, it might be worth it. Go to the USPS's website and search for their Premium Forwarding Service.

Luckiest Dreamer · 01-18-2012, 08:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LindaH

If you are going to be in one place during your stay (as opposed to moving from place to place), the USPS has a forwarding service called Premium Forwarding Service where they will send out all the mail accumulated in one Priority Mail envelope once a week. This includes magazines, so if you use this service, there will be no 2 month limit on the forwarding of magazines.

It's not inexpensive though, but for a two-month stay, it might be worth it. Go to the USPS's website and search for their Premium Forwarding Service.

That is what we use. They will stuff everything that will fit into the envelope and send it every Wed. We get a lot of mail and it has always fit. IT is costing us around $15 each week, paid in advance. You decide when you make the order on how many weekks you need to pay for and they will hold the mail for up to 30 days beyond that date. It will be waiting for you on return. It will not work if you do not have a single address to put on the form. Moving around from park to park is more troublesome. What we did was to rent a box in a retail establishment, have the mail sent there and made arrangements for the proprietor to repackage it and he would send it to whatever address we called in to him about every other week.
Make sure you use the Premium Forwarding! If you just have the mail forwarded some of the mail will be sent back because it is not forwardable. A change of address never seems to work well either as they also end up causing mail to be returned.WE have friends that has their daughter checking the mail box daily and she tosses everything into a box for when they return. She looks at each piece and scans and e-mails the important ones to them. I understand that if they need something that cannot be scanned and e-mailed she will repackage and send.

campgal · 01-18-2012, 09:37 PM

My DH and I didn't have problems with USPS for holding 2 months. We couldn't use the temporary forwarding method because we moved a lot to travel. Once we needed new vehicle insurance card, we asked our insurance to send to our son's address while we visited him and family during the trip. The insurance won't issue new card before we left therefore we asked to send.