Neither rain, nor sleet, nor dark of night—not even a slick loading dock—can keep Mail Services from delivering a package.
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Bill Griffin, Mail Services assistant manager, says at 9 p.m. the night before Thanksgiving a United States Postal Services (USPS) worker indicated he thought the loading dock was too icy to pick up a package for delivery to Detroit.
“It would have sat here from Wednesday night until Monday if we hadn’t gotten it out,” Griffin says.
Employee Jeff Gilboe worked late to load the Mail Services truck and deliver the package to the Ann Arbor Post Office that evening.
“It doesn’t often happen like that,” he says.
The U-M community has come to rely on this dedication to service from Mail Services. A staff of 21 processes 12,000 pieces of campus mail and anywhere from 18,000-25,000 outgoing mail items per day. The team is led by its in-house expert—Griffin.
An assistant manager for the past 14 years, Griffin came to the University with 24 years experience working for the USPS. He joined U-M after a short hiatus during which time he and his wife raised llamas at their home in Manchester.
Griffin is one of roughly 300 people nationwide with USPS Certification in Mail and Distribution Systems Management, earned after taking a four-hour test on all different aspects on mail, packaging and running departments.
For Mail Services, the busiest time is the current season, lasting from just before Thanksgiving through January. Griffin says there rarely are delays in the mail, no matter how heavy the load.
“We make sure we get it all out,” he says.
Some of Griffin’s memorable times at Mail Services include servicing all buildings during snowstorms, helping to get items dispatched in an expedited manner and “just being available to answer questions when people are frazzled.”
“I’m just a phone call away,” he adds with a laugh. “I enjoy communicating and helping people get their projects or their mail out, and making it easier for them.”
“The hardest part is trying to please everyone with postal rules and regulations and keeping people up to date with changes,” Griffin says. “It’s challenging to do that.”
Postage for first-class mail will increase from 37 cents to 39 cents Jan. 8. One of Griffin’s jobs is to make sure the transition goes smoothly on campus.
Griffin says increases in postage rates do not have a considerable effect on mailing; rather, it is other forms of communication that influence the use of “snail mail,” he says.
“We’ve gone from where everything was basically sent only through mail, and then faxes, e-mail, videophones and audio phones, constant phones, into a faster, more demanding world of instant communication, which is why they now call mail ‘snail mail,'” Griffin says.
“People still need hard copies of things, and mail is still one of the cheapest and dependable forms,” Griffin adds. “If campus mail is received by us today, it is delivered tomorrow.”
