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(A brief follow-up to these two posts about issues with the COVIDtests.gov rollout.)
Last month I theorized that the reason I (and many other apartment-dwellers) weren't able to order the allotted tests from COVIDtests.gov was that the determination of what was a unique "residential address" was based on the USPS database, and from the perspective of the Postal Service, a building with an internal mailroom is functionally identical to a single-household residence, since USPS itself is delivering only to the street address, not distributing to the individual units.
I recently had an issue with my bank that seems to support this hypothesis. I receive my bank statements electronically, so I never bothered to change my address with my bank from my mother's house (where I lived in the summer of 2020) to my university housing address when I moved here for law school. Then my bank contacted me to say they were sending me a new (tap-enabled) debit card, so I went to change the address so the card would be mailed to me here in NYC – and the bank website refused to accept my address with the unit number. The bank "verifies" customers' addresses with the USPS database, and the database contains only my building's street address, not the individual unit numbers.
Based on the bank issue, it looks like use of the USPS database – at least in my case – gives rise to exactly the same issue seen with COVIDtests.gov.
Last month I theorized that the reason I (and many other apartment-dwellers) weren't able to order the allotted tests from COVIDtests.gov was that the determination of what was a unique "residential address" was based on the USPS database, and from the perspective of the Postal Service, a building with an internal mailroom is functionally identical to a single-household residence, since USPS itself is delivering only to the street address, not distributing to the individual units.
I recently had an issue with my bank that seems to support this hypothesis. I receive my bank statements electronically, so I never bothered to change my address with my bank from my mother's house (where I lived in the summer of 2020) to my university housing address when I moved here for law school. Then my bank contacted me to say they were sending me a new (tap-enabled) debit card, so I went to change the address so the card would be mailed to me here in NYC – and the bank website refused to accept my address with the unit number. The bank "verifies" customers' addresses with the USPS database, and the database contains only my building's street address, not the individual unit numbers.
Based on the bank issue, it looks like use of the USPS database – at least in my case – gives rise to exactly the same issue seen with COVIDtests.gov.
