If it is consistently late, it is probably sitting at your local post office

The Hawaii Catholic Herald is mailed to you every two weeks. Here’s how it is done:

-- FRIDAY: Hawaii Catholic Herald circulation manager e-mails the Herald mailing address list to Hagadone Printing, the company that prepares the newspaper for the mailing, so that it can begin processing it.

-- MONDAY: The Hawaii Catholic Herald staff proofreads and assembles the newspaper and delivers it by end of day to the printers, Hawaii Hochi on Kokea Street in Honolulu. The color pages are sent electronically via e-mail; the black and white page layouts are physically driven to the printing plant.

-- TUESDAY: Hawaii Hochi prints the paper, about 17,000 copies.

-- WEDNESDAY: Hagadone Printing picks up the Hawaii Catholic Herald from Hawaii Hochi at 6:30 a.m. for delivery to their labeling and mailing operation on Sand Island Access Road. Hagadone sorts the addresses into several mailing lists — single addresses, multiples going to the same address, and Oahu, neighbor island, mainland and foreign destinations. An ink jet machine prints the addresses on the newspapers, which are then bundled and bagged according to post office regulations.

The neighbor islands papers are processed first, so that they can be delivered by 1:30 p.m. to the private freight company, Hawaiian Expediters, to be flown to the Big Island, Maui and Kauai. (Neighbor island papers used to be handled exclusively by the U.S. Postal Service, but several years ago it stopped air delivery of the paper to the neighbor islands, shipping it instead by boat which often delayed home delivery by days and even weeks.)

The newspapers going to Oahu and other non-neighbor island destinations are delivered to the Main Post Office at the airport.

-- THURSDAY: Hawaiian Expediters, in the morning, flies the newspaper to the neighbor islands where its delivery vehicles drive the paper to the central post offices in Hilo, Kona, Kahului and Lihue. The main post offices sort and deliver the paper to the smaller district post offices by Friday.

-- FRIDAY: The U.S. Postal Service delivers the Hawaii Catholic Herald to your home if you live in Hawaii. The Hawaii Catholic Herald is mailed under a second-class non-profit publication license, which means it is supposed to be treated as first-class mail with next day delivery unless the volume of mail makes it prohibitive.

Occasionally, delays at any point of the mailing process can cause the Hawaii Catholic Herald to arrive late. Generally speaking, if the paper is not in your mailbox by the weekend, it is sitting at your local post office.

If you are consistently receiving your Hawaii Catholic Herald two, three or more days late, call your local post office and politely ask them to be more prompt in their delivery. The Hawaii Catholic Herald is a bi-weekly periodical with time-sensitive stories.

You may also report late deliveries to Donna Aquino, our circulation manager, at 533-1791, ext. 321, and she will try to track down the problem.

Mainland subscribers will usually get the paper three to four weeks after the publication date. The only way to get faster delivery is to have the Hawaii Catholic Herald delivered by first class mail which costs $38 a year.