Waited for a Thank You and nothing...Should you ask?

I was under the impression that a person has up to 90 days to acknowledge receipt/send a thank you for a gift. But what if 90 days go by and you hear nothing? Are you supposed to ask, or should you just assume the recipient is a rude ingrate? Is there a gracious way to follow up w/o sounding too pushy?

We have a great postal carrier and each year we remember her at Christmas. Each year she promptly sends a TY note, except this year. While it hadn't been 90 days, I couldn't stand it any longer I finally asked her today. It turns out she never got the gift and she proceeded to tell me this is a problem at her station. She told me a few other people had asked her is she received envelope w/ money, giftcard, etc. and she had to tell them no, she hadn't. She was off a few days during the holidays and a couple of subs took care of her route. She says the regular carrier will ask the substitute carrier but if that person says "no" the matter ends there. It's just one person's word against the other and she opts for keeping the peace and letting God work His justice. In the future I will put the gift in her hand, so nobody ever rips her off again. Isn't it terrible this kinda thing happens?????

I am glad I asked her as we both discovered there was a problem. Poor thing, she was probably wondering why she didn't get a gift after years and years of getting one. Similar situations have ocurred with other people and I have always let it go. But what if the gift never arrived or was lost/stolen? Do we need to follow up or should a gift be given without expectations?

The purpose of this thread is twofold:

1) to raise awareness that sometimes your service providers may or may not be getting gifts that you intended for them, unless they're handed to that person

2) to get your input as to whether a person should follow up if there is no acknowledgement/thanks, and what is a gracious way to do so.

I haven't had any problem like you describe. When I go out to eat or a club, I will not just leave a tip on the table. I also hand it to the intended person. I've seen bus people just casually sticking tip money in their pocket. Maybe they give it to the waitress, maybe not.

Bernie

I've certainly learned that lesson, hand to hand delivery.

most of the time at restaurants they are required to split tips with the others, so it doesn't matter who actually picks it up.
hand to hand is best, but I have never legt gifts or tips for a service worker such as mail trash or newspaper ?

Frilly, of course they are "supposed" to share those tips but as mentioned above, the underhanded person can easily say the tip was a buck and keep the rest! I also think it's smart to give it TO the person, shows them you also appreciated their service by going that extra step.

And of course you can't be as stingy ;)

Answering part 2, in my opinion.. if you gave the gift, and you're expecting them to verbally praise & thank you, then reexamine why you gave the gift.

When I give, whether a financial gift, a tip, or a physical item, I don't expect a "Thank you". I gave it to the person for some reason, not so they'd thank me. For this reason, I'm more comfortable gifting something anonymously rather than tagging my name on it.

Angel, good points. I'm not old-fashioned enough to expect a hand-written, verbal or email thank-you but when the gift was done as above---dropped in a mailbox you always hope the right party got it. If you can give the gift in person then why not.

I dont think she was wanting a 'thank you' persay. I think that because she DIDN'T get a 'thank you' she thought the person may not have actually gotten the gift. ?
If someone always thanks you for something, and suddenly doesn't- makes you wonder where your gift went? Then you wonder if the person you left the gift for is wondering why you didn't leave them anything, if you always have in the past. Maybe you aren't happy with their servicea anymore, or something?

Hey!!!!!! I'm not that old-fashioned either! lol. j/k

frilly is right. The TY in itself is not my expectation neither is how it's delivered (call, note, email, twitter, facebook). What I'm mulling over is the practical aspect of gift-giving. If somebody doesn't acknowledge receipt, how will the giver know if it reached its destination? Is there a nice way to find out or should one simply put the whole thing out of one's mind as soon as gift is sent off/placed in mailbox, etc.

My mail carrier was just an example. But here is another: over 50% of our Christmas gifts were mailed to family living in different cities. Simply not practical to hand deliver with relatives scattered all over the place. Luckily everybody acknowledged/thanked and I was glad gifts got to their destination safely. But what if somebody hadn't? Follow up or just not worry about it?

I say don't worry about it. Giving is just that - releasing something .. once it's given, it's gone. With family, I might ask, "Was it the right thing?" if I didn't hear. With a mail carrier, or a waitress tip, I don't ask or wait for a "thank you".

Got this frame of mind after donating to a few large city homeless folks. I wondered one time if the fellow that got a few dollars from me was "real" or not. I had a small thought that perhaps he was a pro panhandler, and was doing better than me at the end of a "workday". I later realized it was a gift, and it was up to him to do the right thing. I couldn't worry about the gift once it left my hands.

What about wedding gifts? It's been 8 months since the big wedding. I guess they packed up their gifts and money envelopes and left for the moon. Haven't heard boo from the "loving" couple since. Even an email acknowledgement/thank you would have been nice.

burned once, shame on you. Burned twice shame on me.
Once someone treats me that way after I give them something, I find someone else to give to next time. Live and Learn.

i always hand the mail carrier and the ups man their envelopes in person.

i have a friend in another state that i exchange presents with and i don't think that in all the years i've known her that she has ever acknowledged a gift of mine. it's just her way and while i always wonder if she liked it, i never bother to ask anymore.........but we're still close buds and she's always there for me if i need her.

Vossner, you did everything right. It's a shame she didn't get her gifts, but you learned something and now we have learned something too. I think a person has a right to ask the giftee if they recieved it, only because you would feel bad if they hadn't.

Thank you billy for your kind words. I thought I would offer this thread as something to think about, based on my recent experience with my postal carrier, a lovely and caring woman who did not deserve to be ripped off. Perhaps the thread reminded some of us of times when friends/relatives were not as considerate as we might have wanted. But who wants to think about that stuff? Maybe that's what they call "sweating the small stuff" and that is never worth our time.

Let's talk plants instead, lol

Timely thread- My mom was just describing a situation in the family.
Aunt- (mom's sister) sends checks to everbody each birthday. My brother and his wife and child are very slow or non about cashing the checks and apparently about acknowledgeing them too. Or maybe they acknowledge and then are slow to cash, which is a minor pain for my aunt every time she balances her checkbook. She asked them recently about one and was told in this case='' Yeah, I'm going to use it for a hair cut....its in my wallet..."

Well, that's a two career family and they probably don't physically go to the bank anymore much..well we don't either. Pay is direct deposited and then we get cash from machine. Hmm, they can just deposit in the machine....
I don't know what the problem is.

I know another family member always "wants to make sure we got the money"

For restaurants we usually add it to credit.
We have never tipped mail person here.
We tip local paper kids by including it in payment we send to them.
Haircut people can easily be tipped in cash right to them.
We have never tipped garbage guys because we are afraid if we stick it to cans it'll get missed, and its too hard to catch them- they are like lightning.

It was explained to me how it works here in Arkansas, of course every state has their own way, Arkansas doesn't require splitting the tips. If a tip is left on a credit card, it is traded in as cash and given to the appropriate person, if they didn't turn that tip amount into cash their till would be over. The clubs and bars all have tip jars sitting across the bar, very unique, and each bartender has their area and they get the adjoining tip jar.

Our mail lady is best friends with Dave's first cousin and we don't tip her, never thought of it.
Never seen the paper person, we're very rural so they drive and put your paper in your news paper box next to the mail box, and they send a bill, don't show up at the door, so I just add the tip in on the bill.
I just add the tip to the hairdressers check.
Don't have garbage service
Always tip bartenders and DJ's, we tip heavy there. They make minimum wage and if it weren't for the tips we wouldn't have any of those because they wouldn't be able to pay their own bills and buy groceries, and kids can't bartend like they can work at fast food.