Canada Post: ‘Significant portion’ of held parcels out by Christmas

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If you haven’t already received an item held up by the five-week Canada Post strike, it could be coming today or Christmas Eve.

The Crown corporation, whose 55,000 workers were sent back to work by the Canada Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) last week, said in a Friday statement that all the backlogged parcels had been processed and were ready for delivery, if not already sent out.

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In early December, the number of items delayed hit 12 million, per the Financial Post.

“We expect a significant portion of these items to be delivered before Christmas,” it wrote.

To help stabilize the postal network and get more items out for delivery, Canada Post had employees delivering mail in some cities over the weekend.

Delivery days into January

Operations resumed last week, but it was two days later before Canada Post was back to full capacity and began accepting new packages into the system.

With the on-time service guarantee still suspended, there’s virtually no chance anything dropped off today will make a one-day turnaround and the corporation said delays for many domestic packages will stretch into early January.

“Between urban centres, Canadians should expect package delivery delays of two to three days,” the organization said.

“For packages travelling longer distances, expect delays of up to 10 days.”

Anyone wondering where their package is within the system must have asked for tracking at the post office or when they printed a label at home. Otherwise, “there is no way for us to identify that parcel in the mailstream to track it,” Canada Post media relations told the National Post in an email.

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“For misplaced tracking information, the customer should reach out to the sender for that information.”

Even as they continue to process a backlog of international mail and parcels, Canada Post has also begun accepting international items as of Monday morning.

The United States Postal Service, however,  is maintaining its service suspension until its Canadian postal counterparts can catch up. The USPS expects to resume accepting Canada-bound mail within two weeks.

Regardless of where it’s going, Canadians will want to act promptly as post offices will be closed and there’ll be no collection or delivery on Christmas Day or Boxing Day, and again on New Year’s Day.

Union grievances

The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), which has already called the back-to-work mandate a breach of Charter Rights and is challenging the intervention, issued its own statement on Friday saying it spoke with the Labour Relations Board about reported violations of the collective agreement.

“We are hearing about multiple situations that could constitute violations of the collective agreement and are engaging with (Canada Post Corporation) at the national level to sort this all out,” grievance officer Carl Girouard wrote.

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In some instances, workers were reporting that overtime was refused when requested. The union said Canada Post there were no changes to how overtime was managed and “some locations have very low volumes of mail.”

The union is also upset Canada Post required everyone on a long-term assignment to a specific depot, outlet or route before the strike to rebid now that the labour impasse has ended.

CUPW’s existing challenges will be heard by the CIRB on Jan. 13 and 14.

CIRB’s directive extended the existing collective bargaining agreement until May 2025. It also asked Canada Post to carry through with the five per cent wage increase, retroactive to January 2024, that was part of its last offer to the union. Between $500 and $1,000 of retro pay owing, depending on the worker’s classification, must be repaid by Christmas Eve. Full remittance of retroactive pay is due by Jan. 31, 2025.

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