Canada Post to stop home mail delivery

[KelVarnsen]

Only read the first page, but talk of Beep and bagged milk makes me feel happy but also old.

[I-Hate-Hulse]

Originally Posted by Canada 02

crap! all my Christmas cards were sent with insufficient postage

I think this pretty much killed the xmas card industry. Who's gonna spend $1 in postage now + cost of card? Maybe you send 10 or something.

[Minnie]

Originally Posted by SebC

Those are legally exempt from "no flyers". Conventional wisdom is that you'll get more voters from delivering to people with "no flyers" (which in some communities is almost everyone) than you'll lose from the ones who don't like it.

They're from the WildRose. They'll never get my vote, ever. I wouldn't even bring the tripe home to use as liner in a birdcage.

[vanisleflamesfan]

So in 2011 Canada Post was on strike and the Harper government said that they were an "essential service" and legislated them back to work.

Today, the Harper government says that we don't need them anymore.

Wow... going from "essential" to "not needed" in 2 years is pretty impressive!

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by vanisleflamesfan

Wow... going from "essential" to "not needed" in 2 years is pretty impressive!

How is streamlining a process and downsizing staff deeming them 'not needed'?

They're eliminating door delivery and centralizing it. Not abolishing the postal system.

[vanisleflamesfan]

Originally Posted by kunkstyle

How is streamlining a process and downsizing staff deeming them 'not needed'?

They're eliminating door delivery and centralizing it. Not abolishing the postal system.

Yup, massive job losses, poorer service, and higher prices. Sounds like the kind of "streamlining" that we need.

Canada Post has shown profits in 16 of the last 17 years. How about 'streamlining' a process that needs it?

The Harper government 'subsidizes' big oil to the tune of 1.4 BILLION dollars per year. Just in case you are keeping score, that is a LOT more than they give to Canada Post. How come we don't demand that we 'streamline' big oil?

Oh I know... we subsidize oil because they contribute more to the economy than Canada Post... because oil is more important, we don't really need Canada Post...

Well that just brings us back to the Harper Government declaring them to be "essential" once again. Or maybe they just wanted to crush the union.

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by vanisleflamesfan

Yup, massive job losses, poorer service, and higher prices. Sounds like the kind of "streamlining" that we need.

Canada Post has shown profits in 16 of the last 17 years. How about 'streamlining' a process that needs it?

Check your stats, then notice the trend. Canada Post recorded profits for 16 consecutive years until 2011. It has reported losses for nine consecutive quarters since then. So obviously something needs to change to make it profitable again. Regular mail (asides from parcel) in in serious decline. I'd say that that is the exactly the kind of streamlining we need. Or they could wait a decade and go belly-up, or rely on government subsidization.

It's not job losses per-se, it's not re-filling spots after natural attrition. Canada post suffers from the same ability to get with the times as most other unionized environments. They're handcuffed into being slow to adapt which drives them to looking to other solutions, which is what you're seeing here. IMO if it wasn't unionized they would have these superboxes installed already and you'd be seeing 8,000 layoffs right after Christmas.

[Stranger]

It had to come to this. I don't want to see Canada Post be in the hole a billion dollars a year just so a fraction of Canadians can get mail delivered to their door.

I might mail 100 letters a year now. Raising the stamp cost won't cost me that much more. Maybe an extra $30 per year?

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by vanisleflamesfan

The Harper government 'subsidizes' big oil to the tune of 1.4 BILLION dollars per year. Just in case you are keeping score, that is a LOT more than they give to Canada Post. How come we don't demand that we 'streamline' big oil?

Just in case you're keeping score, "big oil" makes money, and feeds a whole lot more to the economy while it's being subsidized.

But you're right, they don't streamline. That's why we didn't just see Devon and Encana come out with sweeping layoffs and cuts to less-than-profitable ventures. Oh. Wait....

If you don't think answering to shareholders, board members, and profit margins as high as possible forces "big oil" to streamline their own businesses I'm not going to bother.

[missdpuck]

Originally Posted by Minnie

Meet him at the door without pants. That ought to help. </mrnopants>

We just watched for ours and managed to catch him one day and told him we didn't want any flyers. We did the same with our delivery guy (contracted) - met him at the superbox by chance one day and asked that we don't get any more flyers in the box - only items that had our actual name and address on them. We periodically get letters from Canada Post asking us to resume flyer delivery to our mailbox but we ignore them. The only thing we seem to keep getting regardless, are political mailings, that aren't addressed to anyone. We shove those back in the outgoing mail box.


Drones.

Oh if you were on my mail route I would absolutely hate you. Just like the people who put the "current resident" stuff back in the box. If you live there, Current Resident is you. Duh.

But this is just a forum, I am not you r mailperson, so Hi Minnie

Perhaps your system is different, but I can't just stop delivering someone's flyers because they don't want them. I would get fired.

No offense--we get paid to deliver mail, not to be your garbage collector. Shoving unwanted mail back into the outgoing box is pretty disrespectful.

We're people doing our best to keep our jobs. We're not drones.

[Minnie]

If I tell them I don't want flyers, they put a little sticker on the inside of my postbox (which are in the superboxes), which indicates we don't get flyers. We don't even want 'current resident' stuff which is why we stipulated that we only want stuff with our actual names and addresses on it. I wasn't aware of the political mailings exception - wonder if I can stick 'return to sender' on it? (kidding ) It never came up in the conversation with our mail guy - who is frigging awesome. He's away for 2 weeks on holidays so we're getting temp coverage - and hoo boy, can we ever tell. People are getting their neighbors mail and we all end up traipsing up and down the street to exchange. I miss him, LOL - so going down to the PO and leaving him a Tim's card or something.

[4X4]

I look forward to the day when flyers are banned. Just a complete waste of paper. Cut down tree, convert to paper, write a bunch of stuff on it, deliver it to the door, pick it up without opening it, drop it in blue bin. Congrats, tree.

[missdpuck]

Down here we have something called "every door direct mail" which are flyers with no address or anything on them. They look just like something somebody would stick on your front door.

Apparently you can request to not get them. we don't get those flyers very often so I haven't run across that. Now that I think of it, that's probably more like what you're (Minnie) talking about.

I don't know how you guys do it, but down here people write "refused, return to sender" on the stuff they get from charities or whatever. What is kind of sad is that if those mailings are bulk rate without an "electronic service requested" endorsement on them, the sender will never even get the item back. We just throw it away. There's no way for the sender to know it was unwanted unless the addressee calls directly or writes.

I get frustrated when new residents put the " Jane Doe or current resident" stuff back into the box as if it's not theirs. Then I've got to cross ut Jane Doe and circle "current resident" blah blah blah..

Nothing personal Minnie, just my postal rant. I luvs ya and look forward to your posts here

Who asked you 4X4. Don't you have some traffic problem to rant about????

You know I don't mean that.....

And yes, Minnie, we tend to love our coffee!!!

[killer_carlson]

Originally Posted by kunkstyle

Why exactly will they *have* to?

They will be dealing with a bunch of angry seniors who are used to 60 plus years of getting their mail a certain way.

I understand the business reason behind it but to suggest it will go over well with seniors is naive.

[MoneyGuy]

I suspect at least one of my kids resulted from one of those door-to-door milk "deliveries."

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by killer_carlson

I understand the business reason behind it but to suggest it will go over well with seniors is naive.

I'm not suggesting it will go over well. I'm suggesting Canada Post isn't going to do anything about it because of some irate seniors who can't walk a block in their slippers. My 90-year-old grandfather has walked/driven 3 blocks to get his mail for as long as I can remember. He's managed, and Canada Post hasn't changed anything.

[Minnie]

Originally Posted by missdpuck

Down here we have something called "every door direct mail" which are flyers with no address or anything on them. They look just like something somebody would stick on your front door.

Apparently you can request to not get them. we don't get those flyers very often so I haven't run across that. Now that I think of it, that's probably more like what you're (Minnie) talking about.

I don't know how you guys do it, but down here people write "refused, return to sender" on the stuff they get from charities or whatever. What is kind of sad is that if those mailings are bulk rate without an "electronic service requested" endorsement on them, the sender will never even get the item back. We just throw it away. There's no way for the sender to know it was unwanted unless the addressee calls directly or writes.

I get frustrated when new residents put the " Jane Doe or current resident" stuff back into the box as if it's not theirs. Then I've got to cross ut Jane Doe and circle "current resident" blah blah blah..

Nothing personal Minnie, just my postal rant. I luvs ya and look forward to your posts here

Who asked you 4X4. Don't you have some traffic problem to rant about????

You know I don't mean that.....

And yes, Minnie, we tend to love our coffee!!!

Well, what we get are store flyers - like from the grocery, Wal-Mart, Home Hardware, coupons for fast food joints, along that line - plus the 'occupant' type stuff. Problem is, we get it triple - because we get that crud in the mailbox, then we get it in the midweek paper (smallish town, once a week local paper), and then again on Saturday, when the kid comes around with the same #### we've got twice already. It's way way way too much.

We got a new paper delivery person too. I miss our last one. She saw our 'no flyers' sign on the house and took it upon herself to remove the flyers from our paper before she stuck it in the paper bag - that sign was really meant for the Saturday flyer delivery. Now we have the noob and they leave them in there - I was spoiled, lol.

I didn't take it personally, no worries. And I really do appreciate our mail carrier - we had 2 really crap ones before him, where sometimes we weren't getting our mail until 11 at night. This guy is quick and accurate and as pleasant as all get out. So when he's away and the temps screw it up, it's very noticeable and makes me appreciate him all that much more. Hence the Tim's card. If I could leave it in the mailbox for him, I would, but I think that's a no-no. Plus, if I leave it at the PO for him, I get to talk him up to the head person there.

[killer_carlson]

The sheer volume of boomers and the effect they will have on our institutions as they age will be impossible to ignore.

[Yeah_Baby]

I'm a little suspicious of the timing of this announcement. Right before Christmas? I smell a negotiation tactic.

[missdpuck]

Down here they also want to eliminate door delivery, and the older people are freaking out. .

Our office has a route in a retirement community that is almost completely door slots.

The community is single story fourplexes mainly set in triads around parking lots.

The woman who does the route doesn't want it changed. More overtime for her , basically. The route takes forever. The other day it took more than 7 hours of walking to deliver it.

In the summer the place is less than half full, yet the po pays someone to walk by those empty apartments. Not to mention the substitutes who are unfamiliar with the route. They have to walk up to every door to see if there's a "vacant" note on it.

@Minnie---11PM??? I thought that was just an American thing lol. Someone told me they were out till 1AM down in Miami. Wow.