Receiving (snail) mail at psych jobs?

[biogirl215]

Okay, I'm not sure if this really fits into the psych forum section, but it does relate specifically to issues with jobs in field... Feel free to move it as need be.

I just found out that I'm not going to have personal internet access (including access to personal email) for a few months. I have a good friend who's doing her internship at a college counseling center and whose birthday is in August. Because we've always communicated via email, I don't have her home address in InternshipCity, and the nature of her internship means she's often AWOL from email for weeks at a time, so there's a good chance that I won't be able to get her address from her before I am sans internet.

Seeing as I still want to acknowledge her birthday (hell, she took time to acknowledge mine while on vacation with her in-laws, so it would only be fair ), I considered sending her a brief letter ("hey, I did remember your birthday--I'm just without email," etc.) care of her internship site.

But then I considered that a lot of psych jobs may not allow employees to receive personal mail at work due to concerns about past unstable clients trying to contact, etc. Is there any "usual standard" for this in the field? Am I just overthinking this?

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[Ollie123]

I would not send it to work.

There's no guarantee that her office would have a problem with it, but many places have rules against personal mail at work. Even ignoring issues with past clients, its essentially costing companies money to have to process personal mail, hence the rules. In many places its not a big deal, and that might be the case for your friend, but imo its not worth the risk.

Personally, I'd rather a friend give me a slightly-delayed happy birthday than risk me getting in trouble at work.

 

[biogirl215]

Thanks for the input. I guess if I don't get her address in time, she'll just get her birthday congrats late. (Have to love the fact that my rent for my summe internship is eating up more than 2/3 of my take home pay--hence the ensuing lack of internet access)