On Thursday, September 25, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) initiated a sudden national strike. This has resulted in an immediate full stoppage of mail and parcel delivery through Canada Post, with many post offices now closed until further notice.
While CNIB is working to minimize the impacts of the unexpected strike on Canadians who are blind, Deafblind, or who have low vision, the disruption of mail delivery will still affect our community and cause some disruptions to CNIB services that rely on Canada Post.
Materials normally sent through Canada Posts’ Literature for the Blind service, may be stuck in the postal network until Canada Post service resumes.
Canada Post has indicated that they will continue the delivery of socio-economic cheques (including Old Age Security, the Canada child benefit and Canada Pension Plan payments), during the labour disruption.
CNIB Service Disruptions
- We know that some participants are still waiting on mail from us and we want to assure you that CNIB is looking into which items may be affected by the postal service stoppage and how we can best remedy the situation. We’ll update you once we know more.
- Some CNIB SmartLife customers may experience delays on orders placed before September 25 and shipped for free through Canada Post. For urgent mobility devices and priority orders (such as white canes) customers will be contacted directly by CNIB SmartLife to confirm whether they have received their items, and replacements will be sent by courier.
- Effective immediately, all CNIB SmartLife orders will be shipped via Purolator. This transition will allow us to continue fulfilling orders in a timely and reliable manner until Canada Post service resumes.
- Production will continue as usual for CNIB Cards, with e-mailed letters sent to participants awaiting CNIB Cards as temporary stand-ins until operations resume.
Advocacy in action
For many Canadians with disabilities, reliable door-to-door mail delivery is a vital public service, not only for accessing alternative-format materials, but also for receiving other critical deliveries they may rely on such as medical supplies, medications, daily living aids, health care information, and financial documents.
CNIB is actively reaching out to the federal government and Canada Post to express our grave concerns on behalf of the people we serve. We will continue to advocate for accessible and reliable mail service from coast to coast to coast, including rural and Indigenous communities.
If you would like to share your concerns with Canada Post about mail delivery in Canada, you can call their General Enquiries number at 1-866-607-6301 or send an email to accessibility@canadapost.ca.
We appreciate your patience and understanding during this time and want to reassure you that we are taking steps to minimize the impact on our participants and operations.
If you have further questions about how the Canada Post strike may impact the services CNIB provides, call us at 1-800-563-2642 or fill out this form.