Change to Lettermail - Canada Post

[sew-sisters]

Canada Post has just announced a major change in policy that will negatively impact our business.

The change in policy is that from September 19th, 2005 onwards lettermail may no longer contain any items which are not documents. Currently, as long as envelopes meet size and weight requirements and do not contain prohibited materials they may be sent as lettermail. Canada Post’s decision to restrict lettermail to documents only is arbitrary and extremely damaging to small business.

By way of example, our best selling item is a packet of fabric squares used to make quilts (it measures 6.75” square when packaged, does not sag in the middle and weighs 47 grams). It sells for US$6.99. In December, 2004 it cost US$0.85 to ship this item. Now, due to fall of the US dollar and increases in Canada Post rates (effective January 17th, 2005), it costs Cdn$1.82. On Sept. 19th this is going to increase to Cdn$5.60 (small packets airmail rate). That is a 560% increase in less than a year. I do not believe that our customers will be willing pay that amount for shipping. Therefore we will lose customers and I am quite worried that if we don't drastically change our business model that we will lose our business.

In the last 18 months we have spent over $7000 at Canada Post. We are a small business, we do things by the book and are profitable. Selling on eBay allows me to stay at home with my children while also contributing financially to our family and in my own small way to the Canadian economy. To maintain my business I need to compete with American sellers. The relative strength of the Canadian dollar and the drastic increases in postage early this year has made it very difficult to make money selling Canadian product to the United States. Additionally, American sellers have the advantage of flat rate priority mailers and media rate packaging as it is - if I lose the letter mail pricing I will lose a significant proportion of my sales. If I lose my business I am no longer earning any money - that hurts everyone.

I beseech you, please join me and countless other small businesses as we demand that we be able to continue to use lettermail for small items. I have written letters to the editor, contacted my MP and MPP and filed a complaint with Canada Post.

Thank you for your time and I apologize for the long post,
Judy

+

[sew-sisters]

Sample Letter
- of course everyone will have to alter details to personalize it --

Dear Ms. Greene,

I am a partner in a small web-based business. We sell quilt making supplies through eBay and our website. Most of our products are low-ticket items manufactured in Canada. 80% of our customers are Americans. Canada Post has just announced a change in policy that will negatively impact our business.

The change in policy is that from September 19th, 2005 onwards lettermail may no longer contain any items which are not documents. Canada Post’s decision to restrict lettermail to documents only is arbitrary and extremely damaging to small business.

By way of example, our best selling item is a packet of fabric squares used to make quilts. It sells for US$6.99. It measures 6.75” x 6.75” x 0.1” and does not sag in the middle and weighs 47 grams. In December, 2004 it cost US$0.85 to ship this item. Now, due to fall of the US dollar and increases in Canada Post rates (effective January 17th, 2005), it costs Cdn$1.82. On Sept. 19th this is going to increase to Cdn$5.60 (small packets airmail rate – our customers won’t wait for surface mail). That is a 560% increase in less than a year. I do not believe that our customers will be willing pay that amount for shipping. Therefore we will lose customers and I am quite worried that if we don't drastically change our business model that we will lose our business.

In the last 18 months we have spent over $7000 at Canada Post. We are a small business but are profitable. Selling on eBay allows me to stay at home with my children while also contributing financially to our family and in my own small way to the Canadian economy. To maintain my business I need to compete with American sellers. The relative strength of the Canadian dollar has made it very difficult to make money selling Canadian product to the United States. Additionally, American sellers have the advantage of flat rate priority mailers and media rate packaging as it is - if I lose the letter mail pricing I will lose a significant proportion of my sales. If I lose my business I am no longer earning any money - that hurts everyone.

I thought that Canada Post was a partner for Small Business in Canada not a saboteur.

I beseech you, please make it possible for us to continue to use lettermail for small items.

Thank you for your time,

Sincerely,

[fenian]

This is the text of an email I've sent today to the constituency office of my local MP (Gary Lunn, Conservative): Feel free to substitute your MP's name, print it off and sign it, and send it away. The more voices, the better............... Michael


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Good Morning, Mr. Lunn.......

Canada Post has recently made some changes to postal regulations which will adversely affect Canadian individuals who sell small items to the US and abroad, both directly and via online auction.

The changes involve the use of lettermail. Hitherto, lettermail could be used for anything, provided the item being sent was not prohibited, and the rates paid met the requirements for weight and measurement.

Effective in September this year, lettermail from Canada to the US or foreign countries, must consist of paper material only. Anything not made of paper must be sent via small packet rate, irrespective of weight and measurement. Small packet rate is several times more expensive than lettermail.

To cite an example........I sell via eBay, and one category I deal in is coins. Often a coin may sell for a nominal sum......e.g. $5. Using lettermail, and packaging the coin well, I could mail this as an oversize item to the US for $ 1.70 or to a foreign country for $3.40. Now, the identical package will cost me $5.60 to the US or $6.95 to a foreign country. This is a 229% increase in cost to the US and a 104% increase to a foreign country.

As I mail a very considerable number of packages in this manner, this seriously affects my ability to maintain a living.

I perceive this as a blatant cash grab by Canada Post. As the content of each package is truthfully and accurately labelled for foreign customs purposes, and as it does not cost Canada Post one cent extra to process the item if the items are non-paper (for instance, paper items can weigh up to 250 grams for the above-quoted rates, while e.g. a dime or other small coin when packaged might weigh 40 grams - so arguably it costs Canada Post less)..........I do not see any justification for this outrageous fee increase.

For small cost items, one cannot simply "pass along the costs to the customer". A US buyer is not going to pay $5.60 for me to "ship" a 40 gram package containing a small item for which he or she has paid only $5.00 to start with. The end result of this will be countless fewer sales abroad, and a corresponding drop in foreign currency coming into Canada.

I am more than just a single voice here. There are scores of thousands of Canadians now in the same position - looking at a large drop in sales, a lower bottom line.........and a corresponding drop in income taxes paid.

Please take what time you are able to spare to look into this for me and for the benefit of your other constituents. Canada Post must be held to account for stating, in effect........"even though the package is identical in size and weight, and the correct postage has been paid, and the contents have been declared correctly....and it's not going to cost us any more to process your package........we're going to penalize you by doubling or tripling your costs.......because the item is not made of paper"!

I have heard that even more Canadian shippers will soon be bulking material across the US border for mailing there..........where the shipping categories are sensible and there are a variety of rates in effect which benefit small business.........such as media mail. As this develops, Canada Post will be looking at reduced revenue, which will, no doubt result in higher postage rates for all Canadians.

Please do your utmost to reverse this extremely unfair and unjustified category "censoring" and rate increase. I look forward to your considered response.

Thank you..................................

[sew-sisters]

Thank you for this - I encourage everyone -- please don't stop with your MP. Send a letter to the Canada Post Ombudsman, to the CEO of Canada Post, to your MPP, The National Post, The Globe and Mail and your local paper (the more of us who do - the more likely one is to get published as they publish letters that represent a sampling of those that they recieve) - letters to the editor can be sent online. I also sent an email to Bill Carroll at CFRB who does the most listened to morning talk show program in Canada and tends to take a conservative positition politically. Goldhawk and Silverman the consumer advocates have also been contacted by me. I am willing to do whatever it takes to stop this arbitrary nonsense - have an idea - let me know and I will try to execute it!

[sew-sisters]

Here are some email addresses/websites to send your letters to:
The Toronto Star lettertoed@thestar.ca
Globe and Mail letters@globeandmail.ca

National Post http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/info/contactus/mailto.html?name=Letters&SUBJECT=Letter%20To%20The%20Editor

Bill Carroll CFRB Radio c/o his producer: ryan.doyle@cfrb.com


Goldhawk fightback@goldhawk.com
Silverman helps helps@citytv.com

You can contact your MP via:
http://www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/people/house/PostalCode.asp?Source=SM

Any Others????

[camrynscloset]

I have just sent an email to my MP! This is so frustrating.

[3alias33]

mirakbiz_inc ... if you find someone in TO who wants to make border runs to post USPS let me know... I wouldn't mind doing that either.
Thanks
Deb

[deztinationz]

Yes, this is going to strongly affect my business as well. I think I will have to change my business completely. Usually I pay $2.90 for shipping 1 DVD to US customer, just spoke to a Canada Post employee today, he is like it is already in affect, you will have to use the Small Packets from now on blah blah blah, which is going to cost me $5.60 just for shipping 130 grams, no one is going to pay 5 bucks just for shipping 1 dvd, I told him it is ridiculous, but he had no explanation for this.

Let's see how it goes. Think we should all boycott CP, but then only if we had a choice 😞

[zarzuella]

deztinationz,

Surface small packet under 250g will cost 3.95, and has insurance included (which letterpost did not.)
If you present this to your US customers as a positive - they pay $1.30 extra for insurance within the US - you may be able to swing this to your advantage by making it seem like they are getting more and better services.

 Not that I'm not with you all on this - I've written to my MP too - but I honestly don't think that anything will work except a boycott, which is obviously not very feasible. I can't afford to cut off my nose to spite my face, but I'm looking at death by attrition here as it is. It costs me $8.95 to mail a .75kg book to the US via surface mail, $11.75 by Air. US sellers can offer media mail, under $3.00US.

Ann

[deztinationz]

Yeah but I always prefer air mail, not sure how many days surface mail takes? any ideas?

[finells]

Hello Everyone,

I feel that we as ebayers have a great power. We spend 1000's of dollars with canada post yearly and they repay us with disloyalty. If I were to suddenly start charging my customers $10 for shipping my business would suffer and fail.

I have set up an online petition to collect signatures against Canada POst and to let them know we will not roll over anymore. I have set the goal for 1000 signatures. Tell everyone you know and lets get this done.

You can follow this link and sign up:

http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/Canada_Post_Fair_Hikes

[momosworld]

This is going to cost our business approx $6000 more in one month. I am seriously considering selling off all our products and just packing it in for the first time in 5 yrs.

Canadapost sees all these letterposts getting shipped so they figure why not just increase the fees and they will make more, what they don't realize is the number of packages will decrease dramatically and they will lose money from all of the online sellers that sell small items.

A big downfall for CP.
A big downfall for us.

[llee2]

There was a time when I sold a lot of CDs. Shipping used to cost me $2.60 or less for postage as an oversize letter. Add a few nickels for the bubblewrap envelope and we could charge a respectable S&H fee to our buyers that would be competitive with US sellers and their media rate. $5.60 for small packet air essentially kills the level playing field.

finells, thanks for the petition. Signed it already. Good luck and hope it works.

Lincoln

[vesivus]

According to Canada Post:
Surface Small Packet: 4-6 Weeks
Airmail Small Packet: 2 Weeks

In reality, surface tends to get there in roughly 2 weeks. I have had a lot of cases where it's taken 6 weeks, however.

Canada Post gets around this by not having "service standards" and only post "expectations".

Wow. Great. No accountability. I should do that with my customers. It'll get there -- some time. In some shape. Thanks for your money, though.

John

[fenian]

Canada Post (local office) advises me that the changes have "nothing to do with Canada Post". They tell me that the US Post Office will now not accept lettermail from outside the US which contains anything other than paper. Everything else must come in via some other route (read "small packet" so far as CP is concerned), or it will be refused and returned by USPS, for "security and customs reasons". So, if I have this right, paper, even if it's impregnated with nasty substances by naughty people intent on doing harm.... is "safe", while Glenda's plastic milk tokens are a "security risk". Does anyone know where this is located in USPS regulations ?

CP tells me the only option here is using "small packet" as there is no other rate class available. So........what we need now (assuming CP is being totally honest with us...hands up all those who think CP is being totally honest with us).... is a new class of mail called something like "non-paper mail" or "non-letter mail". or "no-bad-things inside mail" - which would look exactly like what we were mailing before, and would cost CP exactly the same amount to process, would satisfy USPS officials because it's not lettermail, and, of course, would cost us exactly the same as we were paying before (hands up all those who think this potential new class of mail would cost us exactly the same as we were paying before).

Also according to CP, every other country in the world now has the same regulation - lettermail must be paper....or back she comes! Does anyone know where this is located in Icelandic postal regulations ?

Why can't CP offices have a big rubber stamp that says "NOT LETTERMAIL" to whack on our mailings, and just charge us what we were paying before ??.....

........ Michael

[imagi.nation]

http://forums.ebay.com/db1/thread.jspa?threadID=1000025298&tstart=40&mod=1122295683577

No comment.

Ernie.

[muminlaw]

Ernie, I think that thread only applies to DOMESTIC US lettermail - not international, and certainly not incoming from the really dangerous countries known for their nefarious plots, like Canada!

Michael, I assume Saanichton is your local PO? Is that what Bill was told by the higher-ups? IF they're telling us true (I didn't see many raised hands!) surely there's some spokesperson at Canada Post who can remind the US that we're a friendly neighbour, not bent on erasing them from the face of the globe??!!!!! We're not, are we?
. Glenda
To Golf or Not To Golf? What a stupid question!

[catseye*]

not bent on erasing them from the face of the globe?

No, but a lot of those 'bad' people enter the US thru Canada.

[recped]

not bent on erasing them from the face of the globe?

No, but a lot of those 'bad' people enter the US thru Canada.


Which bad people? And I had no idea it was possible to send a "person" via Lettermail/Letterpost!

--------------------------------------------------

Canada Post (local office) advises me that the changes have "nothing to do with Canada Post". They tell me that the US Post Office will now not accept lettermail from outside the US which contains anything other than paper. Everything else must come in via some other route (read "small packet" so far as CP is concerned), or it will be refused and returned by USPS, for "security and customs reasons".

Michael, you probably know this but these comments are a complete fabrication.

Ben
"What else could I do? I had no trade so I became a peddler" - Lazarus Greenberg 1915

[fenian]

I have now contacted both USPS and the US Customs Service, enquiring if what CP is telling me is accurate (i.e. "this has nothing to do with Canada Post - it's all a USPS/ US Customs requirement"). It will likely take a week or two to get a response.

All I can find in USPS regulations online is that (their term) "letter-post" covers anything under 4 pounds that is not a prohibited substance or item. It does not state that "letter-post" is for paper goods only.

Will post further when I hear back......... Michael

[imagi.nation]

Glenda:

Are you saying the OP in that thread is wrong? It sounds like other sellers in that thread are under the same impression.

As for the U.S. not accepting incoming product from Canada through lettermail because of customs concerns, what difference does it make what service route it takes as long as it has a customs sticker on it?

Maybe Canada Post is being on the level when they say they have to change the rules because of customs regs being tightened but I'm glad some people here are checking into it because at this point we only have CPs word for that, and how many times have we gotten contradictory and just PLAIN WRONG information coming from all levels of the CP organization?

I personally can't use the lettermail service for my goods but if CP is proven to be wrong in this instance it would be great to see affected sellers here hit the news media to try to turn the heat up on CP on this. It's about the only way to get CP's attention nowadays.

In the meantime, I should be ready to ship via the USPS by the beginning of September. I look forward to escaping Canada Post's neverending story of fee hikes and neglect.

Cheers,
Ernie.