I liked sly*cat's letter, so I took it and changed it around a bit because some of the sentences were fragmented, and i added a few of my own ideas. Like sly*cat's original letter, this can be freely reproduced and edited to your needs.
Remember sending letters to members of parliament at parliament hill are free of charge and do not require a stamp. I usually send a new letter every week to 5 different MP's related to the topic. (My local MP, MP in charge of Canada Post, Minister of Trade, and the Prime Minister himself (although it will probably get forwarded to someone else))
Dear anyone who cares about Small Business and it’s affect on our nation,
I wish to bring to your attention a major concern of businesses, large, small and home based. Many Canadian businesses ship product through Canada Post both domestically and internationally. I run a small company based in Toronto that sells items on-line thru my website as well as on EBay. I export more to the U.S than I sell domestically because of the larger market. This is beneficial to both our economy and I because our dollar is not being leaked into the states, like so much of our money is due to large U.S based companies. I am taking American money and investing it back into our economy by selling to U.S customers.
Recently Canada Post announced that they will no longer allow items previously sent as oversize letters to be sent that way effective Sept 19/05. What this means to small businesses in Canada is that small items like cd's, records, magnets, lapel pins, and other widgets that are light weight and small will no longer be able to be mailed as oversize letter post. What that means in terms of cost to a small business is that an item that used to send to the U.S for a cost of $1.70 will now cost $5.60 for a comparable service. Furthermore as a small packet sent by airmail to an international destination will increase from $3.40 to $6.95.
The cost of sending with Canada Post when compared to the United States Postal System is becoming so high it is effectively shutting the US market as well as the international markets to anyone selling small items abroad. What it is costing Canadians to mail $5.60 from Canada to the U.S, the U.S can ship to Canada for as little as $.80 cents – Correct, 80 cents (letter mail rate to Canada). The constant price increases in shipping small items is becoming unpalatable to consumers outside Canada and is causing the loss of sales from the export of goods for countless Canadians.
Small business is the life-blood of the economy yet it is being squeezed out by policies made by Canada Post. Their government sanctioned monopoly means that we have no other options to ship as courier companies are banned from charging rates in competition to Canada Post. Canada Post claims to have competitors yet they fail to acknowledge that priority carriers are only economical when there is high volume shipping occurring (10,000+ pieces). Moreover they do not acknowledge that there are only 2 other high priced alternatives; UPS and FEDEX, because Canada Post owns Purolator and has a special contract with DHL.
Many businesses sell items that retail for only under $10.00. I personally sell records, CD’s, DVD’s, and similar small media formats. For me to ship a record that sells for $3.49 to the U.S for instance I have to charge $5.60 to have it arrive in reasonable time, and it is far from being competitive with the U.S rates. My customers could justify the $1.70 but at the new price of $5.60 it makes it impossible to sell abroad with profit margins over 10% and thus making it worthless to endeavor in such operations. Last year was the government not encouraging small business as an essential part of our economy. With another Canada Post price increase for most services coming in January of 2006, this further makes the above statement false.
If I ship an item weighing less than 250 grams to the U.S it costs me $3.40 for surface mail and $5.60 for airmail. Rates are again increasing in January. Those same items are mailed from within the U.S for under $2.00 CDN. If I ship that same item within Canada via Regular or Expedited parcel it costs anywhere from $5-11 depending on the distance from Toronto. Someone from the U.S can ship that same item across the border and into Canada again for under $2.00 CDN because it will still qualify for USPS economy letter post and the delivery is relatively fast for such a cheap service. What this means is that a U.S Retailer can sometimes ship the same item across the border and into Canada for less than I can ship it 20 minutes away from my house within Canada. I can easily compete on product pricing but shipping costs are out of my control. Why would a Canadian customer buy from a Canadian company when they can have the item shipped from the U.S and save money? In fact many consumers have already been purchasing large quantities of goods outside of Canada and Canada Post is making this easier and easier for U.S businesses to take advantage of this and at the same time, we Canadians are going out of business.
The reason some Canadians are still in business is the fact that they live on or near the border allowing them to cross the border and ship with the United States Postal System for a fraction of the cost to ship it with Canada Post. These rates are putting Canadian businesses at a huge disadvantage that affects every citizen in some way. We need help! We need to be competitive! Most of all we need a voice.
Thank you for reading the concerns of many businesses, Sincerely,
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