A mailroom (US) or post room (UK) is a

room In a building or a ship, a room is any enclosed space within a number of walls to which entry is possible only via a door or other dividing structure. The entrance connects it to either a passageway, another room, or the outdoors. The space is ...

in which internal, incoming, and outgoing mail is processed and sorted. Mailrooms are commonly found in schools, offices,

apartment building An apartment (American English, Canadian English), flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), tenement ( Scots English), or unit (Australian English) is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) ...

s, and the generic

post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...

. A person who works in a mailroom is known as a mailroom clerk or mailboy and the head person (sometimes the only person) is called the

postmaster A postmaster is the head of an individual post office, responsible for all postal activities in a specific post office. When a postmaster is responsible for an entire mail distribution organization (usually sponsored by a national government), ...

. The mailroom is responsible for a company's incoming and outgoing mail. A mailroom clerk prepares outgoing mail and packages prior to their being sent out via the post office or other carrier. In a large organization, the mailroom is the central hub of the

internal mail In a large organization with many employees, there is frequently an internal mail system. The post room or mail room sorts the incoming mail and the 'mailboy' or 'mail clerk' takes it around on a trolly to the various pigeon-holes and direct to t ...

system and the interface with external mail. The postmaster manages the department, clerks assist them and mailboys deliver mail for other employees in different departments using a mail cart or a trolley doing regular rounds throughout the day. Sometimes the mailboys will trolley sort using the departmental slots on the trolley to reduce work at the central hub and to speed internal mail. Working in the mailroom is a stereotypical

entry-level job An entry-level job is a job that is normally designed or designated for recent graduates of a given discipline and typically does not require prior experience in the field or profession. These roles may require some on-site training. Many entr ...

in an organization, and working one's way up the corporate ladder "from the mailroom" is a common idiom. At a few companies the mailroom is the basis or metonym for a training program for highly promising early-career hires. U.S.

talent agency A talent agency is a company that represents actors, authors, musicians, model (person), models, professional athlete, athletes, writers, dancers, and other professionals in various industries. Talent agencies specialize, either by creating dep ...

mailrooms, starting with the William Morris Agency mailroom, became famous for alumni rising to the highest levels in the

entertainment industry Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and Interest (emotion), interest of an audience or gives pleasure and delight. It can be an idea or a task, but it is more likely to be one of the activities or events that have deve ...

, documented in the book '' The Mailroom: Hollywood History from the Bottom Up''.

References

{{Reflist Office work Postal systems Rooms Communication

See also

References