When The Postman Rings Twice And Then Says "Fuck It"

A postman is supposed to deliver mail to you. That's his job. Sometimes, though, the postman thinks it's enough to just ring at your door when you are not home (out to work, perhaps?), then he takes your mail and sends it straight back to the sender with a comment such as "recipient unknown" or "recipient moved away".

I've noticed this behavior twice now, in two different places I lived. The pattern is always the same: You receive normal letters without problems. Your mail box has your name written on it. The senders always write your address correctly. But as soon as it's a parcel that doesn't fit into your mail box, you risk not receiving it at all.

In Germany, there are different possible procedures that are legally possible.

Number 1: Everything goes as planned. The recipient is home and can accept the mail.

Number 2: The mailman asks a neighbor to receive the mail. That neighbor has to confirm this with his signature and will take over responsibility / liability of the mail.

Number 3: The undelivered mail is sent to an automated storage station (needs a code to access the mail) or to a store of the delivery service, where the mail can be picked up. The recipient gets a written piece of information so he knows what to do.

Some postmen go straight for option number 4: Either send it back and claim that the recipient didn't exist, send it to a store to be picked up without letting the recipient know (don't have the time for that shit) or simply throw the damn mail away... who is going to find out?

Mail services have an incredible amount of power over you. They CAN read your mail, they CAN throw stuff away without you being able to prove it and they CAN'T be punished because large companies such as Amazon rely on them and you are only the person on the other end, not the company that made a deal with the mail service.

All I can do is complain and hope that the mail company will transfer my complaint as fiercely and resolutely to the mailman in charge as I sent it to them.

I really want my fish oil...