SueB has a very good grasp of the situation I am describing, better than anyone else who has posted here. Thanks, Sue, for taking the time to help me explain why I consider this part of my job odious.

Let me correct a misconception. This is NOT the University of Minnesota. I work at a much smaller institution. We only have about 2200 mailboxes in use. None of the problems the guest describes are evident here.

I just looked at the official "University Policies" web page and I found nothing in it about official university ID cards. I did, however find the following: "Guests (non-[University] students) at campus-sponsored events are required to sign in and show picture identification upon entry to an event." That's ridiculous. I have attended many public events on this campus—plays, art exhibits, public lectures, concerts, and social events—and have never been asked to show an ID (except when I wanted discounted ticket prices). It just goes to show how little attention people generally pay to "official" policies.

Guest, why are you so fond of addressing me and Clint by name when you don't allow us to address you by YOUR name? (That's a rhetorical question. I think I know the answer.)

Dani, the problem IS the rule. Yes, the people in authority abuse it, but the point is, they LIKE having the rule (and even use illogical arguments to support it) because it gives them the opportunity to abuse their authority. If you abolish the rule, you would eliminate one kind of abuse, and part of their authority.

My supervisor, by the way, is proud of her policy that gives us the authority to make exceptions to the rule. She thinks it makes her employees look more professional, more important. And she tells us that looking professional and important is the key to increasing the departmental budget and getting us all raises. For myself, I'd rather have a rule that we could enforce consistently, as long as the rule makes sense and serves a useful purpose that outweighs the inconvenience it causes. This one doesn't.

In case I left any doubt, I have discussed this at length with my supervisor, both privately and with my coworkers participating in the discussion. And I have discussed it privately with my coworkers. I have used every argument I can think of and gotten nowhere.

You want worst-case scenarios? I'll give you worst-case scenarios:

Case 1: A father sends his daughter a dozen roses on her birthday, which happens to be a Friday. The student comes to pick them up late Friday afternoon. We know perfectly well who she is, but we refuse to give her the roses because she doesn't show the "right" ID. There isn't time for her to go home and get her ID before the window closes for the day. The roses stay locked in our hot office all weekend. When she comes back Monday, they are wilted. You want to make it even more dramatic? Let's say the father is a wealthy lawyer and an alumnus who has donated a lot of money to the University, and a friend of the President. (This is not unreasonable.)

Case 2: We refuse to give a foreign student his visa papers, and as a result, he gets deported.

Case 3: A American student is getting ready to leave for study abroad, and we have his visa, but we refuse to give it to him, and consequently he misses his flight, and loses the money he paid for his airline ticket.

Of course, if I pose any of these scenarios to my coworkers, they say, "No problem. If it's that important, we'd make an exception."

But my point is, who are we to judge whether a piece of mail is important or not? That should not be our job. Most of the time we don't know what's inside the envelopes and packages we handle, unless the student tells us. Why should they have to tell us? Don't they have a right to privacy? Shouldn't we treat all letters and packages as if they're important?

Legally, I think the failure to turn over a package to its rightful owner, after the owner has presented reasonable proof of identity, would be considered negligence, and we would be held liable for any damages, and would have to pay for the wilted roses, unused airline ticket, etc. But it would not be a felony, because the rules about tampering with US Mail don't apply. The material ceases to be US Mail once the addressee receives it. The University is the addressee as far as the Postal Service is concerned. There is a special rule that says that (as I interpret it) in the Domestic Mail Manual, published by the USPS. Anyway, a lot of the stuff we handle comes by private delivery firms such as Federal Express, and so is never US Mail to begin with.

And students here don't rent their mailboxes. They are automatically issued a mailbox when they register. We (the University employees) are careful to call them "mailboxes" and not "PO Boxes." Not everyone understands the distinction. PO Boxes belong to the USPS and are rented to the public. By law, only US Postal Service employees can put mail into PO Boxes. Our boxes belong to the University, and University employees, not USPS employees, put letters into them.