STRASBURG, Ohio — Many in Northeast Ohio are still waiting for letters and packages as mail delivery delays continue across the country, and time is running out for Sherry Schie of Strasburg who is waiting on essential medication for her elderly father.
“We don't have to deliver the mail on the Pony Express, we're not using horses anymore. This is uncalled for. It's ridiculous,” Schie said.
For nearly a month now, Schie has followed the same routine. Every day, she crosses the busy street in front of her Strasburg home to check the mail.
“It's been three weeks overdue,” Schie said. “I'm just like God please let it be there today, just let today be the day that it's delivered.”
She’s praying her father’s medication will turn up any day now.
“He has underlying health issues, and he is retired Navy 30 years, and he has dementia,” Schie said.
Schie orders his medicine through Express Scripts, a mail prescription service, and she says normally it's delivered without a hitch.
“Medicine comes right when it's supposed to,” Schie said.
Scheduled delivery for the latest package was Jan. 6.
“Unfortunately, it never arrived, and he ran out of medication and it's a medication that you just can't stop abruptly,” Schie said. “Elderly people are sometimes on medication and - as well as other people - you're on medicine that you just can't stop.”
To make sure Schie’s father wouldn’t miss a dose, his doctor wrote another prescription for him, but because it had already been filled, TRICARE wouldn’t pay for it, meaning Schie had to cover the cost.
“Even though I have not received it for him, the prescription was already filled, had already been billed through Medicare and TRICARE,” Schie said. “Which means if you need medication, now the delivery service, either United States Postal Service or DHL or UPS or FedEx hasn't delivered your package, your medication, you have to pay for that.”
In the meantime, she tracked down the package facility in Stow owned by DHL, a delivery and express mail service.
She called to try to figure out why it hadn't moved.
“There were no answers, I kept trying to interrupt him and say you know but yeah but I need to know. And he just kind of kept shutting me down,” Schie said.
“And as I kept trying to explain the product is basically medication, he just wasn't getting it and I was getting frustrated and that just made me think, wow, you know, being my dad's advocate - what about all these other elderly people out there who need their medication who don't have somebody who's their advocate,” Schie said.
Then, DHL told her the package was at the Stow post office, but an employee there told her that wasn’t true and DHL still has it.
“He told me that basically they're telling everybody that since February things are in Stow,” Schie said. “He said that 98% of his phone calls are nothing but that from DHL. And it's not true, that these packages are not sitting there.”
As she continues to wait for answers, time keeps ticking, and her father’s medicine gets closer and closer to running out.
“I now only have enough to get him through till Monday. And I have to call the doctor again and get another prescription, and I'm afraid just to only get one week's worth because what if it doesn't come in a week,” Schie said.
“People they’re just not thinking, you know, with wherever they're working. It's like there's people out there expecting these packages that need this stuff. It's not just a Christmas package,” Schie said.
News 5 reached out to DHL for an update on Schie’s father’s medication, but have not yet heard back.
Jade Jarvis is a reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
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