Love Your East Texas Mail Carrier? They Will Have to Refuse These Gifts

(Longview, Texas) - The process of sending and receiving mail has changed and evolved dramatically over the last 30 years or so. It used to be the norm to mail a letter to a friend or relative or send a check in the mail to pay our bills. Today, it's as simple as a text message or paying a bill through a website or app.

Even with all changes at the postal service, getting the mail delivered every day is still very important. You may have that regular mail carrier you want to say thank you to from time to time. While you can get them a gift, there are some restrictions to what gifts they can accept.

Gifts Your Mail Carrier Will Have to Refuse

Something you may not fully know about postal workers is that they fall under the executive branch of the government. The United States Postal Service (USPS), as we know it today, was created by the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 establishing the postal service as a part of the executive branch. That means postal employees have some of the same restrictions as members of the executive branch, including restrictions on accepting bribes.

You may or may not see your regular postal worker during their daily route but you do know of the good job they do getting your mail and packages to you. You will feel inclined to give them a thank you in the form of a gift. Depending on what that gift is, your postal carrier may have to decline what you give them. In some instances, it could be considered a bribe.

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Your Mail Carrier May Have to Decline Your Thank You Gift

At usps.com, there is a section titled Employee Tipping and Gift-Receiving Policy. In that section, you can see the gift restrictions mail carriers must follow and the guidelines you need to follow when giving your mail carrier a gift:

All postal employees, including carriers, must comply with the Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Exec­utive Branch. Under these federal regulations, carriers are permitted to accept a gift worth $20 or less from a customer per occasion, such as Christmas. However, cash and cash equivalents, such as checks or gift cards that can be exchanged for cash, must never be accepted in any amount. Furthermore, no employee may accept more than $50 worth of gifts from any one customer in any one calendar year period.

So yes, you can give them a gift, like a gift card, but it can't have a value of more than $20. That gift cannot be in the form of cash, either. The gift card and/or the gifts during a calendar year cannot be worth more than $50.

There's nothing wrong with saying "thank you" to your mail carrier, you just have to follow the above guidelines in doing so.

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