Five years ago carriers would arrive at work around 6:30 am, sort their mail to the way they want to deliver it and go out on their "walk". When my husband worked in Richmond there was a rural route carrier that liked to run his route. Great exercise as he carried a heavy bag of mail. His area was the farms in East Richmond. If he walked it, it would have been a full day's work. He finished his walk in less than two hours. His walk was done before 10 am and because he was finished delivering his mail, he could go home. They called him "The Road Runner". He's still a good friend and we saw him last week. He's retired and still very healthy. Route evaluation would "pace" out every walk so they were all the same. Carriers close to retirement would have trouble finishing their walk in the allotted time.
Times have changed. In Vancouver they closed the main plant on Georgia St. and moved to Richmond right beside the runway at YVR. I've done the tour and the plant is huge! It's .5 km long, completely computerized. All the sorting is done by machine. When the mail appears for the carrier in Cloverdale, it's sorted. They may not like the way it's sorted but that's how they have to deliver it. Every carrier now has a vehicle. They start anywhere from 7 am until 11 am. They work 8 hours or more. They've been given head lamps so they can deliver in the dark. They have no choice as to their starting time, it's staggered.
This doesn't excuse what happened yesterday but most letter carriers do not like the change. They don't have a "job for life". That letter carrier on the video will be in serious trouble. With cameras everywhere you can't get away with being rude or a danger on the road. Don't judge all Canada Post employees by this person. I know many and they are all working hard and volunteering in their spare time to write Letters to Santa.
I thought I would add a letter that was written by the Canada Post marketing department for the volunteers to send to schools outside Canada. We get many letters from schools both outside Canada.
