P.O Box vs Phsyical Home address (Los Angeles: apartment, to rent)

[LAGuy]

Hi! Since living in Los Angeles, i always debated having a P.O. Box vs physical home address for packages delivery(like books). I was wondering which one is better in terms of safety and speed. Anyone wants to share their experiences? See, i live in an apartment and don't know if i were to order a book, would the post office deliver it to my door. What if i am not around? Will they leave the package at the door or something?

Also, on the gate outside where it lists all the name of the tenants that lives there. My wife name is on there, but my name is not. Would they still be able to deliver it?

Safety as in LOST mails. I am afraid Post office might deliver the book to the wrong address or takes additional days to deliver it since they are waiting for the OPTIMAL times/cost to deliver lots of mails to a certain area. rather than just to one person.

[Christine Joan]

A lot of book sellers (like Amazon) deliver using UPS and they don't deliver to P. O. boxes. You would need to rent a box at a private postal center, such as Mail boxes, etc. that rent personal mail boxes, and then make sure that you placed P.M.B. No. " " on the adress to get those packages. It depends on how often you are home, whether your manager will accept packages when you are not there and how many packages you receive whether it is worth it or not to rent a post office box or private mail box or not. I once rented a box at a private mail box company that was not a franchise and the woman there wanted to charge me extra for everything that came in the door for me. I decided it was not worth it. However, if you own a business, it might to be worth it to rent a US postal mail box because I think if you have cash coming in it is probably safer there than in an apartment building mail box.

[katenik]

the major courier services do not deliver packages to p.o. boxes. you would have to rent a mailbox from a private company receive mail from UPS, fedex, etc. USPS mail will be still take how long it takes to arrive; any delay in reaching your hands will be determined by the frequency with which you retrieve it. if you go the p.o. box route, your mail will be deposited in the morning, usually by 10.

i'm not sure what you mean by "safety" with regard to mail.