This is a perspective from a postal worker who was part of a month-long strike. If you don’t want to read through, that’s fine, just please BE KIND to your postie this season as they return to work, and if you have nothing nice to say, keep it to yourself. This is a response to some of the comments I’ve seen circulating online both during the strike and outside of it. Seeing how people have responded to postal workers was, honestly, awful.
I’ve worked at Canada Post for about nine years, so I can explain a few things from a postie’s perspective. However, this narrative I write, will not speak for every postal worker, as I come from an office that still has on-foot deliveries, and there are different divisions within the company, but I can at least speak about how it’s been for me, and how it’s been for the people I work with.
As I headed to work this past week, I felt deflated and had mild trepidation about resuming. If you’ve been following social media, there were quite nasty comments that were hurled at postal workers. Some, I would say, were steeped in ignorance and a lack of understanding. So I wasn’t sure what I would receive the first week back. Thankfully, most were welcoming and positive, but I received a couple of condescending remarks. And it was frustrating.
Why should I be so bothered?
Because though not every employee at Canada Post is under the exact same working conditions, I know, over the last nine years, the workload has gotten heavier; the routes have gotten longer, the mileage on my body, the millage on my co-workers’ bodies have increased and so has our mental and physical exhaustion. Though this job has always been demanding, it has gotten to the point where I feel like I was being driven into the ground by standards that I can no longer meet.
“Well, you signed up for this kind of work. If you don’t like it, go find employment elsewhere”
When I started, the wage was $19/hr (the wage gap between minimum wage was way larger back then). There was an implication that the longer I stayed at this company, the more seniority I had, the workload would eventually get easier. It would be rewarding. A stable job. A good job. That’s what Canada Post was known for. It was a respectable career.
Years later, instead of having a lighter load, we now walk further than we ever have. Before, I used to recover from a workday, but now there’s a general overhanging fatigue that cuts into my personal life. Where I used to go out in the evening (this was only a year ago), I no longer have the energy to do so. And I’m not the only one who’s felt this shift. For my fellow workers, this change happened a year ago after the company decided our office needed a restructure. They measured the routes and decided to remove an entire route (a full-time job) from our office, and did the same to two other offices in our area. When I heard they were removing a route, I was dismayed, already feeling like I was on the brink of my ability to complete my job. Ridding of an entire route meant they were dispersing it to the rest.
Know what happened? Come restructure?
Almost every Monday, I come home with crippling headaches. If it’s a busy day, it is likely I cannot get my route done in the allotted time frame, though I was perfectly capable of doing that beforehand. It now means when I have heavy mail days, it either puts me into OT (unwillingly) or I am unable to finish the route and have a backlog into the next day instead of starting afresh. It is utterly frustrating for someone who likes to do their job and do it well, to feel like they can no longer complete the task. Though the job was always demanding, now, when I enter work, I’m never sure whether I will complete the day. How would that make anyone feel?
Finding employment elsewhere? Maybe some of us can. Maybe some are already trying to look. But maybe some don’t have that option. Canada Post is made up of a variety of people. Some have been in this job for years and can’t pick up their bags and find something better, especially in this economy where the cost of living has skyrocketed and your average, working-class Canadian is struggling to pay their bills.
So though I may not have agreed with every single thing the CUPW (union side) was bargaining for, I do not agree that Canada Post seems to ignore the ongoing problem of the worsening work conditions. Though I know every business needs to adapt and change in order to keep up with the world, it seems to me that Canada Post is completely fine with making cutbacks at the expense of its workers, burdening them more and more to where they are breaking. Is that really acceptable, in any workplace?
“Well, you’re back to work now. At least you have a job. With benefits. And a decent pay in comparison to others.”
With each contract, the employer tries to take back, finding ways to narrow its cost at the expense of its employees. Yes, we’re thankful we have a job. A lot of carriers love their job. But you know what? This job, which was considered a “great job” twenty or thirty years ago? It’s not as good as it was. By the time you retire (if you can last that long) a letter carrier pays for it with lifelong injuries, but apparently human life isn’t worth in the eyes of some. We’re just a number, a resource to be squeezed and then discarded when no longer working. According to some, we only hold value if we hold a degree in our hand, even though education doesn’t guarantee a secure job, either. Who gets to determine when life has value? Who gets to say that labour doesn’t have value?
“They should fire everyone and pay them for people who really want jobs”
Can you think about that for one minute? You really want to lay off 55,000 workers instead of thinking that maybe, just maybe, there is a reason that many people need to be heard? Yes, I’m sure you’ve seen terrible letter carriers, but I’m sure you’ve seen terrible workers at EVERY SINGLE JOB. The people I work with? Are some of the most honest, hardworking people I’ve worked alongside. They have family members and loved ones they take care of. They want solid work. They care about their jobs, and their community, but does that matter to you?
Replace every single one? I’m sure a company like Canada Post would love to hire people for minimum wage at a job that requires mental and physical labor. I’m sure most companies would love to replace workers who know their rights and value and hire those who don’t know the rules and can’t or won’t stand up when an employer crosses a line.
“You’re a bunch of lazy workers. Anyone could do the job. All you do is stick mail in a box”
Those who say this? I’d love to see you carry mail, bundle of flyers, parcels, walk 25-27k steps a day for about 4-5 hours a day, in all sorts of weather conditions, in an area you know NOTHING about, getting lost over and over again. We’ll see how fast you get the job done. We’ll also see how fast you can sort hundreds of pieces of mail, be organized, and do this on a daily basis without complaint.
I’ve trained dozens of people. Most do not stay due to the instability of work hours when you start as an on-call carrier, and also because the job is NOT easy. Every single person I’ve trained has been shocked at how long the routes are.
Would you like a rundown of what a letter carrier does?
Though I’ve done many vehicle deliveries, which have challenges of their own, currently, I have an on-foot route. Here’s how it begins: you come in the morning and sort. Some days, mail is light. Some days, it is not. You have to be organized. Letter mail, oversize, and parcels. Don’t missort. Because heaven forbid you make one mistake out of the hundreds of letters you sort into your case and accidentally mix it up. Someone is going to yell at you about your incompetence. That you’re stupid as if they could do your job better, as if they have never made a mistake in their entire life. Yet, I don’t see anyone poking their head outdoors when the conditions outside are miserable. They only laugh and joke about how easy the job is on the perfect sunny days when you say, hey, this isn’t so bad after all.
Anyway, once you have your mail up in the case by street name, you then pull it, label it, so you don’t get confused when you’re on the street, then put it into relay bags. You better do this in a timely fashion. The company doesn’t like stragglers.
Sure, sorting, that’s not too bad, right? Pff. It might get easy if you own a route and do the same thing every day and can memorize where everything goes. You can get pretty quick, sure.
But say you don’t own a route. You’re on-call relief. Or full-time vacation relief. If you’re lucky, you get an assignment for a week, maybe longer. If not, you are constantly jumping from route to route, having to learn a new case, maybe learning one every day. You sort hundreds of letters, and if you’re on a vehicle route, sometimes hundreds of parcels. You have to collate your flyers. Depending on how much you get, that can slow you down. There’s so much to do. You start to get overwhelmed. But it has to be done. It has to be delivered. Let’s hope someone doesn’t get mad if you’re taking a little too long.
Now, that you’ve sorted and pulled, if you own the route, sweet you’re probably out of the office by 9:30 (if it’s a good mail day), but if you’re a newbie, you’re probably not out of there until 10:30- 11, depends when you get called in. Maybe you won’t even be out until 12 pm if you get stuck on one of the monster routes everyone avoids like the plague.
Okay, so you’re ready to leave. You might be able to swing back by office sometime during your shift for a break, but chances are, you will not. It takes too long to drive (or cab back, if you’re delivering on foot). So you’re going to have to plan where you’re taking your lunches or breaks, if you fully take them. Inwardly you groan as you hear people look down their nose at you when you dare take a rest. They think you’re “lazy” for just sitting there. “We pay for your wages!” They shout. No, you don’t. Look it up. And I thought every human being in Canada is entitled to a break when working 8 hours? Just because we don’t have a fancy lunchroom to sit inside doesn’t mean we don’t deserve a break. We’re outside workers, and unless the weather is too severe, looks like we’re working out in it while you enjoy a warm meal inside.
We go out in the pouring rain, in the heat when it’s so hot that you feel like you could faint, in the frigid cold, wearing ice cleats for a month one winter (that tweaks your back) otherwise it is too slippery to walk on the road. We walk in the blasting winds, where your fingers grow numb because no matter how many hand warmers and gloves, they soak through as you touch cold mail community boxes. Sometimes you get back home after a long day and no matter how you try, you can’t get rid of the chill that runs in your bones, but it’s a job that requires no skill, I suppose. It’s laziness.
I’ve pulled muscles in my back, my legs, my shoulders. I’ve had to wear a knee brace, in my twenties, prescribed by a doctor, because of the repetitive strain. And I was told by a customer that I was “faking it” for sympathy. I’ve been bitten by a dog, no fault of my own, as it pushed through an unlocked gate and attacked from behind. It wasn’t as bad as I’ve seen some of the bites on my co-workers, though I still had to go to the hospital for stitches. Guess what I found out the following week? The customer blamed me for antagonizing the dog when every day I dreaded going past that house and tried to avoid it as much as I could. I have sprained an ankle when I misplaced a step, but instead of stopping, I convinced myself it wasn’t that bad and finished my route. They hate it when we report injuries. It wasn’t till I got home and it swelled up that I realized that I’d hurt myself more than I thought. Oh crap, let’s hope they won’t blame me for that and try to withhold compensation for an injury on the job. Cause it’s fun when you have to fight for paid time off. I’m sure I intentionally was being reckless.
But yeah, sure, anyone can do this job. Sign up, if you’re interested!
I would say most postal workers did not want to go on a month-long strike. We simply wanted a fair contract that had been up since December 2023. Last year, guys. Instead of getting it resolved, it has now been pushed back further. Will it actually get resolved in a good way? Postal workers didn’t want to “ruin Christmas” by delaying packages and Christmas cards and passports. We simply wanted better wages (where we live in an economy where inflation and cost of living have jumped through the roof) and better working conditions. At least for me, it is the working conditions.
I know change probably needs to come to Canada Post as letter mail is becoming less. But if the structure of the company needs to be remodeled so that it becomes relevant to Canadians, why should hard-working employees be crushed in the process? Why should those who have been faithfully giving their years of service be considered obsolete? Whatever field you work in, whatever education you have, conditions in the workplace should be fair. It is frustrating that the voices of the workers go unheard, especially by a government that can’t even run their own country, a government that doesn’t even seem to care about its own citizens, and you want to say we deserve to be silenced? Why should we not be able to fight for basic human needs?
Here’s the thing. I know there still will be people who literally don’t care about anything that I’ve written, but they probably wouldn’t have read through this long-winded post, anyway. If you’ve read through this, wow, you’re a trooper, thank you. If anything, I hope it just helped you understand where some postal workers are coming from, why we’re frustrated, and why we’re asking to be heard. I hope that some day people will learn to have a bit more compassion before criticizing and spewing comments on situations they know nothing about. Until then, maybe let’s learn to be more careful with our words. Before you make that comment, try to empathize. Ask someone about their job, about their life, instead of first jumping to negative conclusions. Maybe we need to learn to be kind to one another this upcoming year. Do you think you can do that? Do you think you encourage others to do the same?
Gettin' Real 