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RNZ News
26-05-2025
- Health
- RNZ News
Posties upset about not delivering to hospitals
Photo: Otago Daily Times / Gerard O'Brien If you're thinking about sending a get well soon card to a loved one in hospital - you might need to think again about how you do it. The Postal Workers' Union says posties have been instructed by NZ Post that letters and cards addressed to the street address of hospitals must be returned to the sender. It's part of a new return to sender policy applying to businesses and institutions. Kathryn speaks with Postal Workers Union Co-National President, John Maynard. NZ Post says most big businesses, government agencies, shops etc have both a physical address and a postal address - usually a PO box where their mail gets sent. It says mail is still being delivered, so long as it is correctly addressed.
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
'Not good': Concerns revived over recommendation to end door-to-door mail delivery
Judy Frank says no longer getting mail at her door would make life harder. The 78-year-old Regina woman is unable to walk more than a few steps and says she would need someone to pick up her mail if Canada Post stops door-to-door service. "It's very dangerous," Frank said in a recent interview, pointing to the uneven and cracked sidewalk outside her home. Her daughter, Kyara Moon, said Frank once broke a wrist after falling down. Moon lives with her mother and also has some mobility issues. She said door-to-door delivery helps people maintain their independence. "We're trying to keep seniors in their houses," Moon said. "I guess we're going to have to help people who aren't able to get their mail, if this is the way it goes." Concerns over Canada Post ending door-to-door mail delivery come after a recent Industrial Inquiry Commission report recommended phasing out the service and replacing it with community mailboxes. The report says declining mail volume has made door delivery financially unsustainable. About 25 per cent of Canadian addresses, or roughly four million homes in older neighbourhoods, continue to receive mail at their doors. Canada Post estimates it would save about $350 million per year by converting all addresses to community boxes, while providing select door delivery to those with disabilities. Regina resident Joan Lang supports door delivery. Without it, she said some postal workers would likely lose their jobs. But she said she could get used to going to a mailbox. Ways of life have changed before. "We used to get milk delivered to our home, but now we're used to going to the store," she said. Calgary resident Frankie Thornhill said Canada Post could do door delivery once a week, not every day. Many seniors require the service, she said. "I ripped my hamstring off my pelvis three years ago, just from (slipping on) some ice that looked like a puddle," said the 72-year-old. "You get these older people and they got to walk two blocks to the box. That is not good." Canada Post has been in a dispute with the Canadian Union of Postal Workers over a new collective bargaining deal. The Crown corporation received strike notice Monday from the union and, late Thursday, just before a strike deadline, the union called for a stop to overtime work. The union has said it disagrees with most of the report's recommendations and takes issue with "some of the information on which it was based." Canada Post began phasing out door-to-door delivery in 2014, which resulted in about 830,000 households being converted to community boxes. The move was unpopular in many neighbourhoods, where residents complained about losing accessibility and convenience. Some also took issue with damage and litter around the boxes. The federal Liberal government under former prime minister Justin Trudeau imposed a moratorium in 2015, preventing Canada Post from doing additional conversions. Melissa Graham, executive director of the Manitoba League of Persons with Disabilities in Winnipeg, said replacing door-to-door mail with community boxes created barriers. "(Boxes) used to ice up. They used to be in areas that were difficult to get to, if you had a mobility disability," Graham said. "They often didn't have braille, so you could not find your mailbox easily." The report says Canada Post has a program to accommodate those with accessibility needs and that the program should be reviewed and enhanced if required. It also recommends lifting a 1994 moratorium that prevents Canada Post from closing rural post offices. The report doesn't provide a list of post offices that should close, but it points out some in suburban communities that were classified as rural no longer are. For example, post offices in the Ontario municipalities of Milton and Richmond Hill no longer fit the rural criteria, even though they were classified as such in 1994. The post office in the Ottawa suburb of Stittsville was also classified as rural before it was amalgamated by the capital city. Glen Gower, a city councillor for Stittsville, said the community was rural 25 years ago but has changed. It now has a second Canada Post outlet, he added. Gower said replacing the original post office with affordable housing makes sense for what the community needs, if one post office could handle all its mail. "It is sitting on a huge piece of Crown land. But I do want to make sure postal services are maintained," he said. "I think (the original post office) is of less significance than it would have been 25 years ago." The report says ending the moratoriums on rural post offices and community boxes could cause massive public opposition. "Even with public consultation, it is more likely than not that local communities will strenuously object, as will the union," it says. This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 24, 2025. 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National Post
21-05-2025
- Politics
- National Post
Ending door-to-door mail delivery in Canada. What other countries have considered it?
Canada Post needs to end door-to-door mail delivery, according to a recent report by the Industrial Inquiry Commission (IIC). Article content The seismic shift is one of the key tactics the post office can undertake to modernize, while maintaining solvency without being heavily subsidized by the taxpayer, writes the Commission. The recommendation comes as the union representing Canada Post workers threatens to go on strike at the end of this week. Article content Article content It's not the first time the end of door-to-door mail delivery has been considered in Canada. Article content Canada Post announced back in 2013 that it would be phasing out door-to-door delivery of regular mail to urban residents. Back then it cited financial losses due to declining mail volume and increased online/digital communication. Article content The transition began in 2014. The first phase affected about 74,000 addresses in ten communities, including Winnipeg, Calgary, the Ottawa suburb of Kanata and several northern suburbs in Montreal. Article content But the plan came to an abrupt end due to public outcry and political pressure. Seniors and disabled people who relied on the service argued that having to trek to community mailboxes would create hardship. Postal workers protested potential job losses. Then the federal opposition parties campaigned against the Harper government's decision to overhaul the service during the 2015 election. When the Liberals won, the Trudeau government halted the plan, suspending the shift to community mailboxes. Article content
CBC
21-05-2025
- Business
- CBC
Canada Post is in trouble. Here are the facts
Social Sharing Canada Post employees will be in a strike position on Friday, threatening to suspend its mail and parcel delivery across the country. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers, which represents 55,000 of the service's employees, says if there is no progress on a new collective agreement, its members will walk off the job. If that happens, no new mail will be accepted and any items already in the system will be held until the strike is over. Here are the facts on why it's so bad. Here we go again You could be forgiven for asking why we're facing a strike when we just had one in November and December that lasted 32 days and deeply disrupted everything from Christmas gifts to passport delivery. The reason is that that labour dispute was never resolved. After it dragged on for a month with no progress, the labour minister at the time, Steven MacKinnon, told the Canada Industrial Relations Board to order those employees back to work. That happened on Dec. 17. The expired collective agreement was extended until May, with a five per cent wage increase. The idea was that the extension would give both sides time to negotiate a new deal. But that failed, and here we are. How bad is it? About as bad as it gets. The last time it made a profit was 2017. Since then it has lost $3 billion. The annual loss in 2023 was $748 million, even worse than 2022 when it lost $548 million, according to its latest annual report. Until recently, Canada Post funded its operations without any taxpayer money. But that changed in January, when the federal government loaned it $1 billion to stay afloat. This summer, Canada Post will have to refinance other loans worth $500 million and, it says, by 2026 it will need $1 billion a year from the government just to meet its financial obligations. Canada Post has been described as " effectively insolvent, or bankrupt" and its situation as a " death spiral." Fewer letters Canada Post hit peak letter delivery nearly 20 years ago. In 2006, it delivered 5.5 billion letters. In 2023 it delivered only 2.2 billion letters, and that includes a lot of bills and other official correspondence. A lot of people in this country have grown up never knowing the practice of writing a letter to someone and putting it in the mail. But here's the thing. Letters are an albatross around Canada Post's neck. It has a monopoly on delivering them. In return, it agrees to service every single address in Canada (although that doesn't necessarily mean home delivery) at the same price (the cost of a stamp). This is where the numbers really bite. Since 2006, Canada has added three million new addresses as the population has grown. Canada Post has to serve them all. But it's delivering more than three billion fewer letters to them. The mismatch of revenue and expenses is now so bad, it prompts descriptions like " existential crisis." WATCH | Facing an existential crisis: 'Our delivery model has to change,' says Canada Post spokesperson as strike looms 16 hours ago Duration 11:28 What about parcels? When it comes to parcel delivery, there is no monopoly, and there is no set price. You may pay more for shipping depending on where you live, and companies aren't obligated to serve you. You'll easily recognize the big name competitors: FedEx, UPS, DHL, as well as the other players who are contracted by the likes of Amazon. Canada Post admits it's getting beaten. Badly. In 2019, it delivered 62 per cent of the packages in this country. In 2023, it was only 29 per cent. What makes that figure even more devastating is that Canada Post is continuing to rapidly lose its share of a rapidly expanding market. Millions more parcels are delivered every year in this country, but Canada Post is getting less and less of the action. Canada Post says part of the reason it can't compete is that it doesn't deliver on weekends, while many private companies do. It wants to hire more part-time staff to work those days, but the union says that amounts to gig work, and won't accept it. Jobs for life? Really? Canada Post claims most of its employees can't be laid off under any circumstances, which it characterizes as "jobs for life." Indeed the collective agreement says "there shall be no temporary or permanent lay-off of any employee (excluding term employees)" who have been employed for more than five continuous years, in the case of older employees. More recent hires need 10 years of experience to avoid layoffs. Canada Post claims the vast majority of its workforce is in that situation. It says all of this leaves it in that existential crisis, and the situation has to change. The union says there's still time to get back to the bargaining table. But at the moment, mail delivery is set to stop by the end of the week.
CTV News
16-05-2025
- Business
- CTV News
CTV National News: Another possible Canada Post disruption looms
Watch A new report is recommending phasing out daily door-to-door mail delivery amid ongoing labour disputes at Canada Post. Jeremie Charron explains.
