The Heck?

[the_gneech]

So I'm applying for a P.O. Box for various reasons, and I notice this:

11. Two types of identification are required. One must contain a photograph of the addressee(s). Social Security cards, credit cards, and birth certificates are unacceptable as identification. Write in identifying information. Subject to verification.

Wait, wait ... social security cards and birth certificates are unacceptable? What the heck are we supposed to use, then, DNA samples?

Friggin' bureaucracy.

-The Gneech

Comments

[goodluckfox.livejournal.com]

Library card, student ID, work ID, passport come to mind.

[softpaw.livejournal.com]

And to some bills in your name count as id. Stupid I know.

that's what I've always used....

[mammallamadevil.livejournal.com]

although in Arroyo Grande, my name was good enough...(oh, you're Joe's eldest grandkid--welcome home)...

MLD

Re: that's what I've always used....

[softpaw.livejournal.com]

Hah, yeah I can do that whenever I'm in the town my parents live in.

[dhlawrence.livejournal.com]

And driver's licence, I'd imagine. Something with a photo so they know that you're you.

[aki-no-kaze.livejournal.com]

i know here a lot of places refuse to use a provincial health card on the basis that they person taking the ID could memorize the number and scam the system.

[bovil.livejournal.com]

I believe that there's a law that prevents Social Security cards and numbers from being used as ID, enforcement has just been historically lax. The feds had been the only folks who seemed to care about it, but a few years back folks started getting more serious, and we started stripping SSN data out of many of our databases where it wasn't really necessary and replacing it with an internal employee/student ID number.

Birth certificates are proof of citizenship, not identity.

[cyberhorn.livejournal.com]

which ends up being their SSI number anyhow as the schools use that number as a student id number

[bovil.livejournal.com]

Not anymore. About 4 years back we got the dictate to stop using SSNs for student IDs. It took a while to strip them out, but we did.

VDL and your power bill

[mammallamadevil.livejournal.com]

will do just fine...if they don't like THAT, take Buddha down there and thwomp his tushie on the desk....

PO box veteran...I don't remember what I took to get the Agnews box. I think it was a CDL and Pete's PG&E bill.

MLD

[silussa.livejournal.com]

9/11 regulations. :(

[the-mcp.livejournal.com]

Not at all. Supposedly, the Social Security Number was never supposed to be used for identification purposes; it's just that, as Bovil pointed out above, when some businesses and agencies started doing so anyway nobody really bothered to enforce it, so it ended up becoming a de facto universal I.D. number. The reason they're coming down on it now, in large part, is due to the public's rising awareness of and concerns over identity theft and credit fraud.

And the Post Office has required multiple I.D.s to open a P.O. Box for quite some time now; I had to show all that stuff when I first opened my box back in the early 90s. Then, they were trying to combat mail-order fraud and pyramid schemes by making sure they knew who it was who'd rented that box if they started getting complaints about mail fraud.

[aeto.livejournal.com]

I hit that a few years ago, and how I got around it was some of the best non-comedy comedy I have ever seen.

I had the local driver's license, which I THOUGHT would be enough. I thought a SS card would do as #2, but no, it had to have a picture. I have a credit card with both a pic and signature. No, that wouldn't do, either, as it didn't establish location at all. A local utility bill would have done, but I'd just moved.

They said an employee ID card would do, so I pulled out my new ID card from work. This card had only three things on it: my picture, my name, and an unrecognizable icon. Alas, no, that wouldn't do, as it lacked a signature.

So, I asked the lady for a pen, and with her watching, I signed the back of the card. NOW it would do! And sure enough, she accepted it.

Thought, I think she just wanted to get rid of me.

[silussa.livejournal.com]

Actually, they do about the same thing all the time if you present an unsigned credit card; they have you sign it, THEN they accept it.

Ah, the bureaucracy at work. :)

[mortonfox.livejournal.com]

They didn't require two forms of ID when I got a P.O. Box at the Park Ridge post office. Of course, I did that before 9/11 when we were still innocent and trusting.

[hantamouse.livejournal.com]

They may be looking for that photo ID paper with the green numbers.
"Of course Mr. Franklin, right away!"

[laurie-robey.livejournal.com]

Very appropriate icon!

[maxgoof.livejournal.com]

Social Security cards and birth certificates have NEVER been acceptable ID, primarily because neither has a photo.

[dennisthetiger.livejournal.com]

I plan on using my newly acquired driver's license as well as a phone bill as such.

[alaskawolf.livejournal.com]

yep thats the good ol post office for you. i miss working there :(