Waiting for Certified Letters Taxes Some Peoples’ Patience

NEW YORK —  You know the drill on mail delivery: neither rain, nor snow, nor dark of night can keep it from your mailbox.

Unless you pay extra for certified mail.

Miscommunication and problems with a new computer system stranded thousands of certified letters in post offices for weeks -- trouble that left New York City and Connecticut waiting for tens of millions of dollars in tax payments.

“With respect to certified mail, the U.S. Postal Service does not fly like an eagle,” Connecticut Tax Commissioner Gene Gavin said Friday. “It moves like a snail.”

The delays affected more than just tax payments. Court filings, legal documents, immigration papers and other things deemed important enough for certified mail apparently languished in post offices.

Certified mail is supposed to be delivered within three days.

Gavin said certified letters containing $140 million in tax payments were found on the floor in a room at the West Hartford post office. The delays cost the state $300,000 in interest, he said.

In New York City, $75 million in tax payments piled up in a Manhattan post office from mid-June until mid-July. City officials, rather than postal officials, figured out the problem when the number of checks arriving via certified mail dropped off.

Among the checks delayed for as long as a month: a $22-million tax payment, said City Finance Commissioner Andrew Eristoff, who met Thursday with postal authorities. Eristoff wouldn’t identify the taxpayer.

“It was a frustrating meeting,” Eristoff said. “Toward the end, yes, they acknowledged they had a problem. But I do not understand their failure to communicate that to major customers like New York City.”

The city even sent letters to hundreds of taxpayers demanding checks. Taxpayers should not face penalties because deadlines are based on when a letter is postmarked, not when it is delivered, tax officials said.

In Connecticut, postal spokeswoman Christine Dugas said officials had worked closely with the tax department, and the problems were now resolved. For next year, postal officials agreed to process all certified tax returns within a week.

The Postal Service also confirmed some trouble with certified mail in Los Angeles, but denied there was a national problem.

Some officials blamed lackadaisical installation of a new computer system for handling certified mail with scannable bar codes. Tom Gaynor, spokesman for the New York metropolitan postal service, blamed internal miscommunication.

It costs $1.40 to send a letter by certified mail and an additional $1.25 for the sender to get a receipt back confirming delivery.