wowzer said:
I have had cases where I have sent out mail with paper clips or staples, and the mail was delayed becuase they wanted to inspect what was inside the envelope by using some weird method. Has anyone else had this problem? Does having a Muslim name make this more of a problem? If you have been delyed, approx. how long was this delay?
Ignore all these people who flame you. You're just asking a simple question because you're having a small fit of paranoia, as we all do at some point, and in my opinion your question is perfectly normal and doesn't deserve all this sarcasm.
Once, I mailed a letter to a friend of mine. Inside the letter I put a small metallic stylus for a Handspring Visor (i.e. a palm pilot PDA.) I specifically mailed him this stylus because it was neat and it had a little screw-in screw-driver and reset nub, and it also matched his PDA. Anyway, when the letter arrived at his home in Georgia, he found that it had been tampered with, and the stylus that I had mailed him was actually removed. REMOVED. The basta=ds removed it. *sigh*.
Anyway, maybe I didn't affix enough postage for the additional weight of the stylus, or perhaps there was a legitimate reason for the heightened security concern at the time (a few months post-911, I think.) Since it was a relatively large metallic object, it's not all that surprising and now that I think about it, I guess it's okay. Honestly though, I don't think a paperclip or staples will cause you to have any problems. And if you are really worried, send your materials via express or priority mail. But that really is unnecessary. The USPS really is quite efficient and trustworthy, given the volume of mail that they process on a daily basis.
Don't worry about it too much, but at the same time you might as well follow up after you mail them out and ensure that receipt of your materials is properly logged within two weeks of sending them out. Good luck with the app process.
