Way back in the 1970s when I went to school in Mexico I would send letters and postcards to my parents and other relatives. My parents would write back to me and send me bank drafts so that I would have spending money. We thought back then that the mail was slow, but in retrospect it couldn't have been that bad. I was only in Mexico for ten weeks, and there was a steady back and forth stream of communication by mail. The postal service also seemed fairly trustworthy; none of the money orders went missing.
In the years after that it seemed that the Mexican postal service became slower and less trustworthy. Somewhere along the line I gave up on sending postcards when I traveled. The last time I mailed something to Mexico was a few years ago when I sent my friend Alejandro a Christmas card. I sent the card right after Thanksgiving, and he received it just before Easter!
In September my cousin Gail and her husband took a cruise to New England and Canada. She sent me a postcard from Quebec. I did not receive it until three weeks after they had returned from their trip. I joked with her that Quebec must be vying with Mexico for the distinction of having the slowest postal delivery.
Just as an experiment, I bought a postcard to send to my cousin. Yesterday... FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2015... I took it to a local branch of the post office here in Condesa. Anyone want to place any bets as to when it will arrive in Ohio???
My ex, "F," swears that the Mexican postal service is fine these days. He claims that the rise of email has reduced their workload to the point where they can process it fairly efficiently. But I think he's referring to domestic mail, or perhaps just mailing things around DF.
ReplyDeleteI've never mailed anything from Mexico though, figuring it'd take months to arrive at its destination.
Saludos,
Kim G
Boston, MA
Where we've recently discovered that the Postal Service will hold mail for 30 days but no longer. Snowbirds are out of luck, then.
30 days has been the limit at my post office for some years now.
DeleteIn my experience the Mexican Postal Service has improved tremendously. I have no experience with sending postcards, but send and receive a lot of packages.
ReplyDeleteYears ago they did take a very long time and often arrived damaged and missing item, that were declared as having been " lost ". Things still take too long, but less time than before......especially mail from the US.
Packages from Europe and Japan usually get here in ten days to three weeks. Packages from the US take a minimum of three weeks, but usually more towards 5-6 weeks.
The good thing is that nothing has been " lost " for about ten years no. Also, for several years now al international packages from and to Mexico are sent by plane, which cuts down the chances for packages or parts of them being " lost " all along the way while being transported by trucks, plus, they can be traced now.
In doing so I found out that the delays are not always Mexico's fault. Two years ago a Christmas package sat 21 days in the Houston airport. Once it arrived in Mexico City it took 3 days to clear customs and another 5 days to get from the airport to my post office and to me.
It is still kind of slow, but much, much better than it use to be when I got here twenty years ago. I am especially glad that the things I order actually get here.
My BIG complaint is that personal packages from here to other countries are limited to 2 kilos ( 4.4 pounds) and that postage is out of this world.
Glad that your experience has been good, but having a Christmas card take 4 months to arrive in D.F. did not give me much faith in their service. We will see how long it takes for my cousin's postcard to arrive.
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