Fake newspaper carriers are soliciting Christmas tips

I honestly had no clue that's how deliveries work. I just figured carriers got paid by the day or by the paper or something to that effect.

When I was a kid, I remember my parents subscribing to the area metro and constantly having to cancel because the carriers were so unreliable. When it came to delivering to our paper box (which was right on a main road), whoever the carrier was would usually deliver consistently for about two or three weeks and then we'd be lucky to get it four out of seven days.

I always figured it was some slacker kid who got paid the same no matter how many papers he delivered and so he didn't care if he got to us or not.

 

Do any modern-day deliverypersons know how to fold a newspaper? What, you put it in a plastic bag? You talk about having it easy! When I was a kid . . .

 

Don't look at it as a tip; look at it as a Christmas bonus.
I worked at a golf course for a couple years and every time around the holidays, they'd have the proshop guys come in and have a mini-party for us. Members would come down, hang out for a few minutes and hand us an envelop with like 5 or 10 in it. We'd leave with a couple hundred each. It was their holiday thank you to us.
I don't have a paper boy, so I have no dog in this fight; but if I did and he did a good job, I'd throw him a 10 or 20. Hell, my ex-girlfriend's dad used to bring a couple of six-packs out to his garbagemen around the holidays.
Good will goes a long way.

 

I've been on both ends - had a route as a kid, and folks were generous at Christmas. But then, I was a kid, and they had specific instructions on where they wanted to find their paper. Some had a paper box along with a mailbox, others wanted it on their porch and still others had me open their door and deposit it inside (oh, how times have changed).

When I started having the paper delivered, it was still being done by kids. I always tipped at Christmas. Then came the move to the "big city"... well, Cincinnati. Delivery people were adults, rarely put it the same place twice in a row, were all over the place time-wise and if they missed you, well... "we can deliver it with tomorrow's paper."

No tips from me.

 

At my first job after college, I lived in an apartment and they would just drop a stack of papers off by our mailboxes. I was getting three papers at the time, the two local ones and the NYT and my NYT was stolen every day unless I was standing there to receive it.

I called the apartment manager and he said the paper carrier had the code and could drop them off at everybody's door, but had refused to do so. He said the previous carriers had been willing to put them at each person's door. I called and complained. I called my paper to complain about the delivery and they said there was nothing they could do about it. Then I called my competing paper, which also delivered the NYT, and then next day and every day after that it was at my door. That guy got a tip.