When caring for your elderly parents, it’s vital to monitor the mail they’re receiving. If they’re still living on their own, you need to track the bills and the checks coming in, any charitable solicitations, all the financial statements, political ads, and even potential scams.
And thanks to the United States Postal Service, it couldn’t be easier. The USPS offers “Informed Delivery”, an email preview of the letters and packages that are coming that day. You simply go to the site, create an account for your parents’ address (use one of your other email addresses if you already have your own USPS account), and enable Informed Delivery.
Every morning you’ll get an email with pictures of the letters your parents will be receiving. The email will also include information on packages that are arriving that day, and that will be soon. It’s not perfect – sometimes it’ll say there’s no image of a piece of mail that’s coming. But it’s a great way to monitor the mail your older or elderly folks are getting, and an important part of caring for them.
And don’t forget the other important way to protect your parents: change their phone number.
