When I was a little girl I’d wait on the corner for the mailman. I liked walking with him to our house. I was always excited about my Ranger Rick magazine coming. I felt so special and important walking with the mailman too.
I hated the mailboxes at our first married home, a cute townhouse at the beach. They were so small. I couldn’t wait to have a house of our own so we’d have a real mailbox again. With our first house our neighbors at the end of the cul-de-sac replaced their mailbox with one that locks because they’d had problems with theft. Our second house had a centralized mail unit for all the houses on the block. It was a pain to get the mail and the box wasn’t big, but it locked. My parents stopped mailing items from the two outdoor mail drop boxes in town on weekends or after last pickup. One of those boxes had been vandalized and mail stolen. They started to wait to mail items or walk them to the drop boxes inside the post office.
Why am I talking about mail delivery? What does mail delivery have to do with money? You may have noticed a theme emerging about keeping mail secure. We’re entering tax season. Before the end of the month we all should have gotten the necessary documents to file our tax returns. These documents have everything a thief needs to destroy your finances. It is imperative to keep track of your mail to protect your identity. Mail thieves count on people not checking their mail daily or they’ll follow the mail truck to pick up mail as it’s delivered. Mail thieves will even replace stolen mail after making copies of the pertinent parts.
I wish this were something no one had to worry about.