Cameron Summerson
While digital delivery of many important messages is pretty commonplace these days, there are certain things that have to be delivered through traditional means. What you may not realize, however, is that the USPS (United States Postal Service) offers a service called Informed Delivery that gives a sneak peek of your physical deliveries directly in your email inbox.
Welcome to Quick Tips, a series where we offer tips and tricks that aren’t necessarily new but may have gone under the radar or otherwise not be well known.
Each piece of mail you get is scanned daily as part of the USPS’ sorting process. And when you sign up for Informed Delivery, you can get a copy of those scans directly in your email. It arrives every morning, allowing you to catch a glimpse of any letters, bills, circulars, packages, or even spam that are heading your way. It’s a killer service—and best of all, it’s totally free.
All you need to do is sign up for a USPS account. From there, you’ll verify who you are and where you live. This process will take a few days because USPS sends a physical piece of mail with a code on it that you’ll need to input before Informed Delivery can be enabled. This ensures that you are who you say and that they have the correct address.
That’s all there is to it. You’ll get a preview of all incoming mail every day, along with package tracking. It shows packages arriving that day, as well as things that are arriving soon, so you’ll know what’s coming a few days before it shows up.
Aside from Informed Delivery, a USPS account also allows you to manage package deliveries, schedule redeliveries, and get notifications on package status. Overall, it’s a great resource—especially if you get a lot of deliveries.
This is a service that I’ve been using for years and one I’m often surprised to hear that people don’t know about. If you haven’t heard of it before now, I highly recommend checking it out. You’ll be glad you did.
