New Mailbox Rules May Limit Users’ Privacy, Convenience

Along with unlisted telephone numbers and dark sunglasses, privacy-conscious Californians have made commercial mailboxes a common accessory.

But a new federal rule intended to crimp mail fraud is threatening to remove some of the anonymity and convenience enjoyed by mailbox users.

In an effort to make life difficult for scam artists who use private mailboxes, the U.S. Postal Service this week began requiring box renters to submit proof of address and two forms of identification, including one with a photograph.

More important, all mail received by renters now must have the initials PMB--for private mailbox--precede the address.

“People use private mailboxes to perpetrate schemes because they make it harder to find them and easier to shield their identity and location,” said Pamela Prince, spokeswoman for the postal inspection service in Pasadena. “This will help consumers cut through the confusion.”

In issuing the changes, the Postal Service cited two dozen cases in 1998 in which mailboxes were used in schemes to defraud consumers or businesses.

But the rules also may raise the visibility of mailbox users who have legitimate reasons to keep a low profile, such as police officers who don’t want criminals to get their home addresses, battered spouses in hiding, celebrities, and residents of rough neighborhoods where mail routinely gets rifled.

The private mailbox industry was born in California in the early 1970s. There are 2,195 box rental stores in the state, a disproportionate slice of the roughly 8,400 nationwide.

Conceived when there was a three-year waiting list for post office boxes, private rentals became staples for small-business owners, frequent travelers and people who live on boats or in motor homes.

But in recent years, boxes have played crucial roles in dozens of illegal schemes.

It has become increasingly common for scam artists to apply for credit cards under assumed names using mail drops as the billing address, card issuers said. The credit card industry loses hundreds of millions of dollars annually to identity thieves, American Express executives said.

Renters also pass off mailbox stores as their offices, using the stores’ street addresses and listing their box number as if it were a suite.

Many do so to put a more professional face on businesses started in spare rooms and garages.

“I’d rather not advertise that my entire office is 18 inches deep, 4 inches high and 3 inches wide,” said Lon Sobel of Santa Monica, publisher of Entertainment Law Reporter, explaining one reason he rents a box on Wilshire Boulevard.

But the same innocuous manipulation helps the unscrupulous persuade consumers to trust business offers they shouldn’t.

“It’s very, very easy to hide behind a mail drop,” said Valerie MacLean, spokeswoman for the Better Business Bureau in Mainland, Canada.

Shady Canadian telemarketers often use U.S. mail stores as collection points for checks sent by their victims, MacLean said. “Consumers don’t know who they’re dealing with or where their real office is if something goes wrong. Neither do the police.”

The rules took effect Saturday and allow the Postal Service to suspend service to mailbox stores that do not comply. Stores have a 60-day grace period to collect additional identification, and six months before all mail must bear the PMB designation.

The rule changes and the time frame for meeting them have provoked mixed reactions from mailbox stores and their customers.

“I think it’s a good idea because there’s been a lot of fraud lately, especially involving credit cards,” said Meena Patel, owner of the Mail Room in Fullerton. “The customers aren’t very happy. I’ll probably lose some business.”

Executives with industry leader Mail Boxes Etc. said the changes will not be overly burdensome and will help curtail the wave of fraudulent activity that has washed over their business. The San Diego-based company has about 3,700 franchises worldwide, with 220 in Southern California.

“Whenever box holders are found committing a crime, it reflects negatively on us and our industry,” said Richard Hallabrin, Mail Boxes Etc. spokesman. “The only customers we expect to object are the ones with something to hide.”

Other store owners argue that the more stringent requirements unfairly stigmatize their clients.

“You and I might have concern doing business with someone with a box, but that doesn’t mean everyone with a box is a crook,” said Kevin Mercier, owner of Mailbox Plus in Long Beach, who rents 268 boxes for $10 to $20 a month each. “This is going to mark all of them.”

More than 75% of the 900 box renters at Post-Tel Business Center in Santa Monica are small- business operators or professionals, said owner Leanne Jewett.

“We have doctors and lawyers, movie stars and publishers,” she said, disputing the Postal Service’s depiction of box renters as shadowy. “One of Timothy Leary’s books was published with this address.”

The updated rules build on existing California and federal rules regarding proof of identity. Since 1994, California rental agents have had to keep copies of box renters’ photo ID. Agents caught violating the provision were subject to fines of up to $500.

But now box users will need two forms of ID showing a home address and a serial or account number that can be traced. And anyone, not just police, can request to see the information they submit.

“We have one customer who imports silver jewelry and he’s terrified about that,” Jewett said. “Another one--a casting agent--people are going to be banging on his door in the middle of the night. They’ve taken away the right to privacy.”

Privacy concerns aside, box users reserve their most virulent complaints for the PMB address change and the Postal Service’s power to return mail not properly marked.

Andrew Michalik of Santa Monica started a software company out of his home 13 years ago, using a Post-Tel box as his business address.

He estimates he will have to spend tens of thousands of dollars to reprint stationery, business cards and promotional materials with the PMB address, not to mention what it may cost him if his clients don’t adjust.

“I guess that check for $3,000 will be returned,” he said. “It’s going to crush my cash flow.”

Some box-rental agents suggest the regulations are payback for a political confrontation several years ago, when mail stores successfully lobbied to block post offices from providing packing service and selling mail-related novelty products.

“There’s definitely some bad blood,” said Charmaine Fennie, director of Associated Mail & Parcel Centers, a 2,300-member trade group for mail stores.

The Postal Service is confident the changes can make a dent in mail fraud. Similar rules have made post office boxes harder to exploit, Prince said.

But many box users doubt they will hinder the criminal-minded from preying on the unwary.

“Does the post office really think that someone stupid enough to mail money to someone they don’t know won’t do it if the address includes PMB?” Sobel said. “I don’t.”