Right in the centre - Canada Post rules make no sense

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Published on Thursday, February 6, 2025

By Ken Waddell

Neepawa Banner & Press

I have heard repeatedly, and from various sources, that Canada Post is making a very questionable decision in regards to local mail sorting.

By local mail, I mean a letter or parcel that is dropped off at a given post office for another customer at that same post office. So let’s say a letter from Mrs. Brown is dropped off at the Post Office A and is addressed to Mrs. Jones at Post Office A. It would seem to make sense that the local Post Office staff would sort through the mail and simply put all the mail addressed to that Post Office in a tub or bin and send out all the out of town mail on the next truck. That would make sense, but that is not the instructions from Canada Post. All, all mail regardless if it is addressed to someone in that same post office or for another Post Office is supposed to be sent to a regional centre for sorting.

I asked Media Relations at Canada Post for clarification. I must say I have submitted questions before to Media Relations and the responses have been informative, polite and quick, so good on them.

I asked, “ We’ve been told that local post offices are required to ship all mail, even local mail to a regional centre for sorting and then it’s shipped back. Can local mail not be sorted at the local Post Office? That way there could be same day or one day delivery?”

Because I live in Neepawa, I asked about that Post Office in particular.  

Here is what I was told, “As the letter mail originates from Neepawa Post Office, it would be consolidated in Brandon and then dispatched to Winnipeg where all product originating from Manitoba is processed on their high-speed equipment. From there, it is then sent to Brandon for the final processing and sort before it is dispatched to Neepawa to be sent out for delivery or pick up by the customer. The mail processing system in Neepawa has been in place for more than a decade. The process enables Canada Post to better monitor mail volumes in order to plan and respond to customer needs as needed. 

It takes approximately three business days for mail to arrive at its destination, when mail is being sent within the same province.

If customers have questions regarding their postal services, they can contact Canada Post’s Customer Service team online at canadapost.ca/support or by telephone at 1-866-607-6301 (TTY: 1-800-267-2797)”

So I asked the following question a different way just so I would know exactly what is happening.

Can you clarify  if the process “consolidated in Brandon and then dispatched to Winnipeg where all product originating from Manitoba is processed on their high-speed equipment. From there, it is then sent to Brandon for the final processing and sort before it is dispatched”  applies to all Southwestern Manitoba Post Offices?

Media Relations answered, “Yes, we can confirm that all letter mail flow through Brandon to Winnipeg for all southwestern Manitoba post offices as Brandon is the centralized distribution centre for this part of the province.”

So there you have it folks, even if the letter is dropped off at a particular post office for a customer at the same Post Office, it has to be shipped to Brandon, then to Winnipeg, then back to Brandon and then to your local Post Office.

And, they openly say, it can take three days to get it back to the customer. That, by the way, is three business days and doesn’t include weekends. If you drop off a letter on a Friday, it could take five days to get into the intended box number.

Is it any wonder that Canada Post is losing money operating under rules that make no sense at all? I know it’s not polite to call a company’s decision makers stupid but I think this process makes it difficult to not apply that description in this situation.

The letter goes to Brandon, then to Winnipeg, then to Brandon and back to the originating Post Office. After all those truck rides, it still has to be put onto the local P.O. box by local staff so there’s no saving of staff time at all. All this process is doing is making unnecessary work. It still takes the same amount of labour and time to put it in the mail boxes regardless if it is done initially at the local post office or after the letter has made it’s three day trip.

I would recommend that Canada Post re-examine this deal but I suspect that unionized employees at Brandon and Winnipeg might object.

Canada Post is bound up in poor practices, bad rules and hide bound union protectionism. Guess we know where customers rank in importance in this process.