Customer Reviews

McGraw-Hill's Postal Exams 473/473C (No. 473/473c)

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I found Mark Alan Stewart's McGraw-Hill's Postal Exams 473/473C book a first-rate guide to preparing for the U.S. Postal Service's Exam 473. Stewart's book familiarizes you with the exam format and content, contains effective strategies for approaching each part of the exam and provides drills that build confidence and that also give you a sense of how to pace yourself. The book also provides seven practice exams that help you identify your weaknesses and strengths. Combined with what the Postal Service itself provides, reading Stewart's book and doing the drills and practice exams is well worth the money - and quite sufficient to prepare you to do well on the exam. I have one quibble, however. On the important memory section of the exam (Part C, Section 2), Stewart advises us to ignore things like Ave., Ct., etc. and to write down only the street names. That's useful but omits that sometimes you also have to remember what kind of street it is when coding addresses for delivery routes, not just the street's name. Remembering the street name is most important but sometimes the testers - and even Stewart's practice tests - will provide the same street name but a different kind of street (e.g., Ave., Blvd., Lp., etc) - and to code it correctly you have to remember the kind of street it is as well as the street's name. Other than that quibble this book is right on target.

This item was literally meant to train you in how to take the actual test, instead of simply providing you with strategies and letting you loose on some practice exams. Each section was broken into several build-up practices to train your brain into thinking a certain way in order to make the actual tests easier to understand and respond to. I only wish there were more build-up practice exercises, really, as you can definitely see results in the way you approach each section after working the exercises. The book also includes brief overviews of strategies for each section and detailed descriptions of your instructions for each portion of the tests and whether or not a section is scored, as well as notes as to which sections of the test are safe to 'guess' on, and which will penalize you for wrong answers. Overall, and excellent guide, and I would recommend it in and instant.

Don't be misled by thinking if you buy this booklet you stand to get a job in the US Postal Service. The US Postal Service recently offered a buyout to clerks and mail handlers because of the huge drop in mail volume. It was partially successful but the Service is still overloaded with employees. The Service and the unions are trying to fill vacant positions elsewhere with excess employees with limited success. Layoffs are looming. In other words there are no career jobs to be had. There is also currently a hiring freeze. So while this booklet may be helpful when a test is offered, don't expect it until 2011 or later. You are best off saving your money and passing on this offer.

The book was helpful but the drills and practices were difficult time wise as you had to go further back in the book to mark you answers. I do feel I benefited from the suggestions on how to answer the questions.