Canada Post’s announcement regarding changes to postal service proved to the best of a bad news scenario for the post offices of Keremeos, Kaleden, Okanagan Falls, Cawston and Hedley.
The changes in service announced last week - mostly involving door to door delivery - will not be noticed in any of our region’s post offices, since none of us get door to door delivery.
At least for now, the prospect of reduced service or post office closures in our area seems to have diminished, for the time being.
We will notice the stamp price hikes, however, and no doubt there will be continuing pressure on small post offices in the face of declining letter mail.
If there is an upside to the local postal scenario, it has to be around the continuing growth of parcel mail carried by the postal service.
Canada Post’s network should still give it an edge in this category, as it is able to provide pick up and drop off service in most of the region’s smallest communities.
Postal services around the world have all acted in different ways to adapt to the change in useage; Great Britain privatized, while the U.S. has made drastic service cuts.
We feel Canada Post made a good choice in the actions they took last week, as it it appears that locally at least, there will be little change in service or employment in the industry - good news for small communities like ours.