Some Christmas gifts found their presents had not arrived in time for the holidays, despite ordering weeks in advance
SAN RAMON, Calif. – Some who mailed Christmas presents for weeks early in the year found themselves not acting early enough when Christmas arrived with their gifts in transit.
The US Postal Service said on its website that it was “experiencing unprecedented increases in volume and limited employee availability as a result of the impact of COVID-19.”
Austin Race of Grand Rapids, Michigan, placed an online order for a collector’s model die-cast of a NASCAR race car on Nov. 30. It hadn’t reached his father after the postal service passed through his neighborhood on Thursday evening, even though he was notified on December 8 that it had been sent with a two-day priority mail.
His gift was in Opa-locka, Florida, the last time he checked the tracking number, about 1200 miles south of where he ordered it in Mooresville, North Carolina. Race, 21, resigned himself to telling his dad that he will have to wait a little longer for his gift.
“I understand the situation, but it’s still a bit frustrating,” he said.
Joanna Goldstein ordered Christmas decorations online on Nov. 17 for her 10-year-old son’s soccer coach and her son’s boyfriend. She thought it was time to get out of a store about 80 miles from her home in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Everything looked fine on December 11 when she received a message from the postal service that the ornaments had been received in Columbus, Ohio.
But then the package made a journey through distribution centers in Warrendale, Pennsylvania, Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Lansing, Michigan, before seemingly getting stuck in Detroit.
On Wednesday she was again informed that the delivery would be later than originally expected. Her son was angry, but Goldstein takes it on.
“I was frustrated last week when I thought, ‘Come on, come here,’ but now I’m just laughing it off,” she said.
She told her son that the ornaments will be on the tree next year and that they will tell a story about the long journey they took during the pandemic.