From the December 17th Postal Bulletin:
All Houston, TX Post Offices receive hundreds of requests each month for the four postmarks popularly known as the “Space” postmarks, These Post Offices are now consolidating the canceling process to one Post Office so they can better serve their customers.
The new mailing address for all Houston, TX Space postmark requests has been changed to:
Space Postmark Request
c/o Postmaster
Sam Houston Station
Attn: Mr. Kenneth Cooper
1500 Hadley Street
Houston, TX 77002-9998
Post office patrons have experienced significant delays in mail service in recent months..This has resulted in considerable impatience and anger among philatelists..There are several reasons for these delays including many employees out sick due to the Covid virus and a practice called “looping”. Looping involves sending a piece of mail through P.O. station “A” which is then forwarded to P.O. station B and finially to its destination. These pieces of mail may bounce around until they leave the loop. This results contribute to inefficiemcy and significant delays to mail delivery. These practices should be investigated and corrected.. CoVid illnesses could be corrected by better control of PCP equipment and good practices.