What's Buggin' You? Mailman's shoddy drop off

DALLAS - A Dallas homeowner says she’s glad for her home security cameras, otherwise she may not have known what her mailman was up to.

She was bugged by what she saw so she called FOX 4’s Saul Garza for help.

Sharonna Hawkins of Dallas said she just happened to be home one afternoon last month. She glanced over at her security system monitor and saw her letter carrier about to deliver a package.

She figured she’d meet him at the door. She waited for him to ring the bell, but he didn’t. Instead, she heard a thump.

“So when I opened up the door to look at him, he goes ‘What’s up?’ and drove off,” she said.

Hawkins said she had to hit the rewind button a few times on the surveillance video to make sure she saw correctly. The letter carrier tossed her package from the middle of her yard to her front door.

“I was just like wow. I just could not believe it. I could not believe it,” she said.

Luckily there were no fragile items inside.

Hawkins tried to call her local post office the same day to complain, but she said the number she looked up was disconnected. She then called the main United States Postal Service customer service line.

“They gave me the same number so I told them the number was not correct,” she said.

She was given a different customer affairs number and told she would get an email response within 72 hours. She never heard back and decided to give FOX 4 a call.

“Since it was bugging me I’m just asking. I do not want that gentleman to even come by and do my mail,” she said.

Hawkins said had she not been home and paying close attention, she may not have ever known how the package was really delivered.

The United States Postal Service has since apologized to her for the way her package and complaint was handled. The post master said that is not how all letter carriers handle the thousands of packages they deliver daily.

The USPS said for privacy reasons, it cannot say what disciplinary action it took against the letter carrier. However, appropriate action was taken.

“I don’t know if he was fired that day or if he had a bad day, but that is somebody’s package. Treat me like you treat everybody else and if that’s the way you deliver mail then you may need a permanent day off,” Hawkins said.

If you have something that’s bugging you, give Saul Garza a call at 214-468-7458 or email him at buggin@kdfwfox4.com.