Time and the tides wait for no one, and the U.S. Postal Service won’t either if residents of the North Olympic Peninsula don’t get their federal income tax returns to a post office before closing time on Tuesday.
In big cities, the line of drivers dropping off their tax returns at the post office just before midnight April 15 is a familiar sight on the late night television newscast.
But don’t count on that anywhere northwest of Tacoma.
“We don’t make any special provisions for procrastinating federal taxpayers on tax night,” said Ernie Swanson, U.S. Postal Service spokesman in Seattle.
“It simply isn’t feasible to do it in a place such as Port Angeles or Port Townsend.”
Not even Bremerton’s post office will stay open late on Tuesday, he said.
The only post offices that will be accepting tax returns late on Tuesday are located in Seattle, Tacoma and Olympia, Swanson said.
Post offices in those cities will continue collecting mail from the boxes periodically throughout the night up until midnight, he said.
The only post offices that will keep their service counters open until midnight are the main post office in Olympia and the Riverton post office at 32nd Avenue South, Swanson said.
Mail from those post offices staying open late will be taken immediately to the processing center, where they will keep the April 15 date on the postmark stamp for a while to handle that last incoming mail, he said.
Mailing your return from one of those contract postal stations often found in grocery or convenience also is acceptable, as long as you drop it off before the last outgoing time on Tuesday, Swanson said.
Post offices on the North Olympic Peninsula will operate on their regular schedules on Tuesday.
