Ravenous Wolf
01-03-2004, 07:30 PM
The more articles I read about Identity Theft, the more I like my private mailbox.
It is really easy to steal mail.
My neighborhood, it is a snap to walk off with someone elses mail. We don't have community mailboxes and our mailboxes are four these four mailboxes in one stand (that makes for few mailboxes on one side of the street and none and the other side of the street).
Nothing of financial value ever comes to my house.
Everything is sent directly to my private mailbox.
Now that I have moved, it is a bit of hassle but in a way, I don't mind checking my mail once a week. There are only bills in that mailbox.
I also don't like P.O. Boxes.
They have lots of disadvantages. You can only receive US mail so that leaves out FEDEX, UPS, etc...
I would not recommend the UPS store because they have strict rules. Nor would I recommend private mail centers that insist that your address include PMB before the box number.
Most independant private mail centers simply allow you to use the # symbol before the box number.
That is actually the result of a struggle against the Post Office. The government hates losing a monopoly, especially when free enterprise does something more efficiently. The Post Office wanted to crush the private mailbox industry but a few congressman intervened and managed to get a compromise by allowing the # symbol to be placed before the box number.
The Post Office claimed that private mailboxes are used for fraudulent purposes. Congressman Ron Paul asked what kind of proof was used to arrive at this conclusion. After much hemming and hawing, the Post Office admitted that they didn't have exact figures other than knowing that fraudulent activity does occur with private mailboxes.
As a result, private mailboxes are here to stay.
In addition to protecting against Identity Theft, one of my biggest benefits is that I like controlling my privacy.
My checks have the private mailbox address and that is what I use for my employment and everything else that is semi-public information. I have my car registration through there.
If that is the address that I use to conduct all my business, then that helps with my privacy.
Of course, anybody can go down to the courthouse and find the deed to my house, etc... But this layer of privacy is easy to maintain and it is also an easy first line of defense to keep anything malicious out of my doorstep.
And finally, all my credit transactions have been done with my private mailbox for the past five years without a single problem.
In fact my loan officer from my mortgage company didn't realize that the private mailbox was not my residence until the part of apartment leases came up. The loan officer still kept everything under the private mailbox address, even after I moved into my house.
It is really easy to steal mail.
My neighborhood, it is a snap to walk off with someone elses mail. We don't have community mailboxes and our mailboxes are four these four mailboxes in one stand (that makes for few mailboxes on one side of the street and none and the other side of the street).
Nothing of financial value ever comes to my house.
Everything is sent directly to my private mailbox.
Now that I have moved, it is a bit of hassle but in a way, I don't mind checking my mail once a week. There are only bills in that mailbox.
I also don't like P.O. Boxes.
They have lots of disadvantages. You can only receive US mail so that leaves out FEDEX, UPS, etc...
I would not recommend the UPS store because they have strict rules. Nor would I recommend private mail centers that insist that your address include PMB before the box number.
Most independant private mail centers simply allow you to use the # symbol before the box number.
That is actually the result of a struggle against the Post Office. The government hates losing a monopoly, especially when free enterprise does something more efficiently. The Post Office wanted to crush the private mailbox industry but a few congressman intervened and managed to get a compromise by allowing the # symbol to be placed before the box number.
The Post Office claimed that private mailboxes are used for fraudulent purposes. Congressman Ron Paul asked what kind of proof was used to arrive at this conclusion. After much hemming and hawing, the Post Office admitted that they didn't have exact figures other than knowing that fraudulent activity does occur with private mailboxes.
As a result, private mailboxes are here to stay.
In addition to protecting against Identity Theft, one of my biggest benefits is that I like controlling my privacy.
My checks have the private mailbox address and that is what I use for my employment and everything else that is semi-public information. I have my car registration through there.
If that is the address that I use to conduct all my business, then that helps with my privacy.
Of course, anybody can go down to the courthouse and find the deed to my house, etc... But this layer of privacy is easy to maintain and it is also an easy first line of defense to keep anything malicious out of my doorstep.
And finally, all my credit transactions have been done with my private mailbox for the past five years without a single problem.
In fact my loan officer from my mortgage company didn't realize that the private mailbox was not my residence until the part of apartment leases came up. The loan officer still kept everything under the private mailbox address, even after I moved into my house.