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Home > Guides > Missing Informed Delivery mail
Don't panic: Informed Delivery shows a piece when it is scanned during sorting, not when your carrier has it, so mail can appear a day or two before it arrives. If it never comes, flag it in your dashboard as not received, wait a few days, then file a Missing Mail search and check with your local post office.
The images come from cameras at the mail processing plant, not from your carrier's bag. A letter is photographed as it flies through automated sorting equipment, often a day or two before it reaches your route. So the dashboard shows "this piece exists in the system" rather than "this will be in your mailbox today." Timing gaps are normal. Real loss is rarer than it feels, because the scarier scenario (you saw it and never got it) has several boring explanations first.
| Step | Action | Details |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wait a few days | Pieces are routinely scanned ahead of delivery. Give it several days after the scan before you treat it as lost. |
| 2 | Flag it in your dashboard | Open the piece in Informed Delivery and mark it as not received. That flag feeds USPS data on missing pieces. |
| 3 | Check your household and neighbors | Mail gets sorted into the wrong pile at home, and carriers do misdeliver to nearby addresses. |
| 4 | File a Missing Mail search | On usps.com, the Missing Mail search lets you describe the piece, the sender, and the scan date. USPS runs the search and contacts you with the result. |
| 5 | Contact your local post office | If the piece matters (a check, a legal notice, a card with a gift), talk to the office that delivers your route. Clerks can spot pieces held for an address problem. |
Start inside your Informed Delivery dashboard: open the mailpiece and mark it as not received. That does two things. It tells USPS the piece went astray, and it creates a record tied to the scan date, which helps if you escalate. If nothing shows up after that, file the Missing Mail search request at usps.com with as much detail as you have: what the piece looked like, who sent it, and the date it appeared in your dashboard. USPS sends updates as the search runs.
One thing the dashboard cannot do is tell you where the piece went wrong. The scan happens at the processing plant, so a piece that disappears after that was either misdelivered on your route, returned somewhere in the system, or delayed behind other mail. Your local post office is the only office that can check what actually happened on your route, which is why it is the last and most useful step for anything important.
No. Canada Post has no mail-preview service that emails you images of incoming letters. For missing Canadian mail, your options are tracking (if the sender used a tracked service), checking with the sender on how it was mailed, and then contacting Canada Post customer service or your local delivery depot. The general missing-mail workflow still applies: wait a few days, check with the sender and neighbors, then report it.
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LetterAgent is a working name. Prices include print, postage, and our service fee. US prices in USD, Canadian prices in CAD (Canadian prices exclude applicable sales tax, added at checkout). Currently in private testing.
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