The Corrections system in the State of PA is alive and well. Unfortunately in our experience the administration at some of the prisons isn’t aware that there is a recession going on, and who it is that pays the salaries of civil service bureaucrats. Putting the screws to small minority (woman owned business) seems to be an enjoyable way to pass the time to some of these erstwhile state employees.
We serve about 3,000 prisons. We are acutely aware of the security concerns facing the facilities, and that the prison has an interest in monitoring everything that comes in to inmates and goes out from them. That being said…..
Starting a few weeks ago we mailed a series of advertising pieces to the state prisons in PA. They are no different than the pieces we send all over the country, however we admittedly made an error. In the first series of ads we forgot to take out our Pen Pal advertising. PA does not permit inmates to advertise for pen pals. Our piece however, does clearly state that all services are not available in all prisons. One would think that is sufficient…But not to the good folks in the PA prison mail rooms. A couple of facilities sent back over 50 pieces of mail. Not wanting to ruffle the coffee and donuts crews who work some of the mail rooms we reworked the packages and resent them. WITHOUT BOTHERING TO OPEN A SINGLE ONE, at least two facilities returned over 100 packages. The cost to us, a small business, was over $250.00. When we attempted to call and find out what was objectionable, we received what is commonly known in prison circles as the “spin.” What it really amounted to was that the young lady in the Mail Room didn’t know how to answer us. It’s just a whole lot easier to send the stuff back and let small business worry about it by themselves. The problem is that when small business goes belly up, everyone suffers.
We have no trouble complying with whatever these folks want. They have a tough job to do, often under difficult conditions. That however in no way mitigates what was done to us and probably a whole lot of other small businesses. More mail means more work, and it would appear at least on the surface in some PA prisons, the work ethic isn’t exactly what it should be.The
Tags: bureau of prisons, county inmates, department of corrections, federal bureau of prisons, federal prison, Inmate information, inmate lookup, inmate search, money, prison, prison inmate, prison service, Prison transportation, prison web sites, prisoner, prisoners, state prison, Tansportation to jails, Transportantion to Correctional institutions, transportation to correctional institutions, transportation to prisons