No locks. Nothing to stop people stealing it. Just the honor system. Even though I've never lived in a fancy neighborhood, I've never had anyone steal from my mailbox. For whatever reason, mailboxes are pretty safe from theft in the US. Amazon packages on the porch are another matter entirely.

The mailbox is owned by the government. Anyone opening and/or removing the mail from the mail box who is not a postal worker or the recipient has committed a Federal Crime and is subject to being hunted down by the marshals of the Postal Service. They are quite serious about it, they are not a bunch of "failed" postal employees they are trained and armed and they do a great job.

they don't lock. It has a flag you put up if you have mail in. So if you have outgoing mail, you put up the flag. The mail man puts it down if he's taken it (and you have no new mail). Similarly, they put up the flag if you have mail (so you can see from the house)

See that piece of metal sticking up off the right side of the mailbox? That is the flag. It is up in that pic. It means outgoing mail. When the mail man gets the mail he will just push it down.

It's a federal felony to tamper with US postage service mail (this includes messing with mailboxes)...that deters most people. Besides porch package thieves...

There is a flag on the side that we put up to signal that it's outgoing mail.

Replying to your comment below. We can still receive subscription items or small packages in our mailboxes, as long as it's small enough to fit inside. Not every building in the US has a "mailbox" though. In suburban areas and neighborhoods, it's very common to have a smaller, shallower letterbox on the exterior of the house next to the front door, instead of a mailbox on a post at the end of your driveway. Condominiums and apartment complexes often have a block of letterboxes joined together either inside the main building, or outside where everyone can access them. Those require a key to get your mail. You can only fit small parcels in them. Lastly, some houses in America still have just a letter slot in the front door, which hinges upwards just enough to slide flat, standard sized mail directly into your home or between your doors.

Well I've been educated today about mailboxes. I don't think mailboxes in the UK would work, mind you, the postal service aren't armed :-)

The approved models all have the same master key like the TSA approved bag locks or the fire service switch on an elevator

Tampering with someone else's mail is a federal crime, like attacking a police officer, which means you can go to a very bad prison for several years if caught. I have a friend of a friend who drove around town whacking mailboxes, as a teenager, and ended up serving like five years in a federal penitentiary because mailboxes are technically the property of the US government. So it's like shoplifting in a country where they cut your hands off for stealing--basically, it's just not worth it.

Since mail is a government service, messing with it is a felony. Fines up to a quarter million and five years in jail.

No problem Charlotte! I can answer that!! Outgoing mail and incoming mail is usually unsecured in a personal box (in housing neighborhoods). You lift the little flag on the side to signal outgoing mail to the postal worker. They take it and lower the flag, and put in any incoming mail. Yes both your incoming and outgoing mail can be stolen (it happens). Usually it’s best to take the mail to a post office to make sure it gets to where it needs to go!

So everyone replying isn't wrong but not all mailboxes are open. Apt complexes for example have keys. The post office has a master key that openes the entire bank and they load them in through the top.

Mailboxes like this are common in rural areas, in my experience, much less so in suburban/urban. You have outgoing mail, and there's no post drop box for, oh, 30 miles in any direction (they have to get 100,000 pieces of mail per time period to put up a post drop box).... You put your outgoing mail in the box in the early AM, raise the red flag. The mailman drives up, takes your outgoing mail, drops it into his Outgoing Box, and then shoves in your Incoming mail, lowers the red flag, and bob's your uncle. And NOBODY stole mail, outgoing or incoming. Just wasn't worth it. Many thefts of such mail as credit card offers, etc., are stolen at the main postal sorting facilities, or by the postal people. Everyday citizens operated on honor system, and it's still working. We can do the same here with the mailbox attached by our front door, but there's a post drop box for outgoing mail within a nice walk, so we just use that. AND not all boxes do this. Apartment buildings I've lived in *never*.

There is a flag on the side of the box, place up to let mail person know you have mail to send, don't know if they still carry stamps.

in France, mail workers still have a key for personal mailboxes, so probably

There is quite a bit mail theft in Seattle, Washington, USA. I hate it. I have bought a locked mail box for about $100-$200 USD just as well as some of the neighbors. It does help to have a locked mailbox but I have heard stories on the news that they will use a crowbar to either break into the locked boxes, or actually I've even met people (friend of a friend) that said they will just take the whole mailbox. I've met more than a few mail thieves through friend of friends and I made sure that they are not my friend and for them to not come back around. I seen it on my security camera that one of those thieves I had met had left a stolen package in my front yard as they were roaming around my property while I wasn't home... One day I spotted lots of mail thrown into the gutters on side of 4 street as I was walking home from work and I posted on the neighborhood network about it and mentioned that I'll come back in my truck to notify the police about it, but the mail was gone by then

I used to deliver newspapers in rural Holland and I must say a lot of houses had this green postbox with a lid. Some could be locked but they hardly ever were. Talking about the 90's but pretty sure it hasn't changed.. Maybe identity theft isn't that common...

You can purchase a mailbox that has a lock and the mail carrier has a special key that opens it. We had one but never locked it. When we leave mail to go out, we turn up a little red flag that is attached to the side of the box signaling the carrier that they should pick up whatever is in there. Otherwise they would just think you didn’t pick up your mail from the day before.

I no longer put up the flag when I have mail for pick-up since my neighbor used to do that and several times someone actually stole his mail. They took checks he was mailing to pay bills and altered them and cashed them. She did get caught and the book was thrown at her.

We use the mailbox for outgoing all the time. Clip it with a clothespin to the outside of the mailbox. The postal workers does have to open out screen door to get to the mailbox which is attached to our front door so nothihng is visible from outside and I wouldn't post important mail this way.

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When ordering anything of importance/value most folks will use their employers address as the shipping address. That's what I do anyhow. Sometimes there will be a central location for several mailboxes in one area, those are usually locked up, but the ones in front of your house are mostly just sitting there w/o being secured.

Some mail boxes (Suburbs and country homes) are for each individual house. And the people that live in cities, apartments, or other close groups of houses, they have locks for their own mailbox. And for outgoing mail, it has the senders name and address in the top left and the recipients name in the middle

There's no locks. And the box, if not attached to the house, is often placed where the driveway meets the road so that mail can be delivered without the mail person having to get out of the truck. Nobody really stoops to stealing mail because theft is just a misdemeanor, but messing with someone else's mail is a FEDERAL crime. And depending on what you stole from who, can mean serious jail time. They take mail related fraud VERY seriously in the U.S.

I live in Sweden. This outgoing mail worked at our summerhouse when I was little, at least. You put the outgoing mail in a plastic bag, put it in your mailbox and placed a stone on top of the mailbox to show the mailman there was something to collect there. I doubt they had stamps though, so you had to put that on yourself, or the recipient would be made to pay before delivery.

You put your flag up and the carrier knows you have mail to send

This is a rural delivery box; lift the red flag on the side to let the mail carrier know there's outgoing mail. No lock cause you know your neighbors and delivery schedule, but you could install a locking box if you want. My neighborhood has a centrally located group of boxes; carrier's key opens the front of several individual boxes, like in an apartment building; there's a slot for outgoing.

Put the red flag up if you have outgoing mail,but be warned,thieves can steal your mail if the box is unsecured. Carriers do have arrow keys to unlock banks of boxes that are all together,such as in apartment buildings and cluster box units.( Former letter carrier here,btw,18 years.) And also,we are NOT required to carry stamps because they have to be paid for before we leave to carry our routes. Also,carriers have been robbed for money and stamps, so they stopped doing it as a matter of carrier safety. Most will gladly purchase a stamp for you if you leave money to do so,i or pay out of their own pocket and leave you a note to be reimbursed. I did it countless times for customers.

In a big public area (like my old apartment complex), the letter-carrier had a master key that would open up the "wall" of mailboxes. But yeah, these kind are ubiquitous in rural/suburban areas. I've mailed stuff several times by leaving cash.

I leave a note for my carrier that there is mail inside the box to be mailed.

They don't lock, and there's a little red metal flag that you lift up to mark that you have something to send

I live in a small, safe town. The post office certainly does pick up outgoing mail. The boxes have flags on them so you can let the carrier know there's something to pick up. This wouldn't work in every environment, but many areas are safe. No need for a lock.

A lot of times there is a slot in the front door or, in older homes, a slot directly into the house.

Rural areas have blocks of boxes that the mailman can open the whole front or back to put mail and each family has a key to their own part. they have a slot for outgoing letters and you can put a package at the back or front where he opens with a note 'please pick up'

Used to be safe. A couple of weeks ago they managed to break into 2 mailboxes by me, that are the locking ones. We just don't mail anything out worth anything, and try to limit incoming mail

It's pretty common in places that get mail. I live in a rural mountain town and I don't get home mail delivery so I have to pick up my mail at the post office. Moving here was the first time I needed a key to get my mail.

Well according to my USPS branch mail carriers are not actually required to take outgoing mail. We found this out because in the last 2 years we've had crazy amounts of trouble with mishandled mail , misdelivered mail, and also mail never getting picked up any more. We got told "oh they don't actually have to pick it up but please support the USPS."

This type of mailbox is typically for homes in the suburbs. If you live in an apartment building, the mailboxes have locks. Here is a link to show you. Each home has a mailbox at the curb. https://images.app.goo.gl/oCL1LeeB5W9bYsK2A

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Single, individual boxes are for incoming and outgoing. There is a metal piece called a flag you life up to show mail to out. Otherwise they will think you did not pick up and will add to it. Group, neighborhood mailboxes, are huge metal ones with little compartments, one per house. They have individual locks on one side for the owners, and the back takes 1 key and it opens it all. Of you have a small package that does not fit there, they have slightly bigger compartments to fit it. They provide a key for you with the number of which compartment to open, and the key doesn't remove after by anyone-so you can't steal- but the postal worker the next day.

Also, mailboxes, like the one in the picture, have a "flag" on the side that you raise if you have out going mail. It lets the letter carrier know you have something that needs to be sent. When I lived in the city, the boxes are on the house, so less chance of theft. In the suburbs, they're at the end of the driveway, but I've never had anything taken, knock on wood. Had no idea about the putting money in the box thing til now, though.

You put the red flag up if you have mail that you need to be sent, and you don't touch it if you don't have anything in it. It's an honor system really, but people don't really want your bills or christmas cards so nobody really does anything. I've always lived in really quiet neighborhoods though.

Yes. There's a little red metal flag that you put up to tell the carrier you have mail, although one told me they don't have to pick it up if there have no mail to drop off. I've never used it for checks except when it was attached next to my front door. I don't always trust it & usually drop it in a box somewhere.

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Not all of them. Most of us drop off our mail at the post office.

The side of the mailbox has a red flag that can be raised and lowered. You raise it to indicate that the mailbox contains outgoing mail. And in the US, it's a federal felony to interfere with, delay, steal, and destroy mail.

No locks in most rural areas. In cities, they use either direct to house delivery or more common in newer areas a central mail point that contains the different mailboxes for the neighborhood. What stops people from stealing your mail...simple, two things, one basic honesty in the rural areas, and two who uses the mail anymore.

OK I did not notice that the answer was underneath the question. I'm a little slow