Canada's Modern Post

Traditional and Modern Canadian Letter Carriers

A general introduction to the typical traditional vs upcoming modern letter carrier in Canada and its economic impact.

A letter carrier is a word typically used for those who deliver by foot in urban areas as an employee of Canada Post corporation.

Letter carriers at Canada Post deliver letters, magazines, registered, priority or parcel items that are under 3lbs, magazines, and flyers.

Each letter carrier is designated a route. Each traditional route roughly consists of 400 to 1000 points of call. Points of call mean each mail receptacle on a house, apartment, business, community mailbox etc. For example, a house would count for one point of call, an apartment with 250 suites would have 250 points of call.

A complex mathematical calculation of distance x volume x coverage x average walking speed and a number of other important variables are used to arrive at an average 8 hour day. This formula has been in use and refined for well-over 30 years.

Each letter carrier starts his day at his mail sorting workstation. When he or she arrives, there is typically about 1200 pieces of machined letter mail, 250 pieces of letter mail that needs to be hand sorted, about 300 pieces of magazines and oversized envelopes that need to be hand-sorted, and also about 10 small packets, 10 traceable items, and a number of flyers that have to be hand collated.

This is just an average and it varies considerably between route.

When it comes to flyers for collation, there are wide differences between regions and even routes. In Winnipeg, some areas can average 4 sets of flyers per day per year, while other poorer areas are less. In Vancouver, this number can average over 10-15 sets per day. It is not fair to give an average.

The collation and delivery of flyers is not really calculated in the 8 hour formula. Sometimes five to ten minutes are allotted for management of flyers in the formula but not often. Letter Carriers are instead paid by the piece. It is usually around 2 cents per piece.

If, say, it takes a letter carrier 30 minutes to collate ten sets of flyers, and this extra time puts him or her in a situation that makes the work day 8.5 hours long, one cannot ask for overtime or extra hours. It is considered lost time or paid for by the per piece agreement. Some strongly do not like the idea of flyers for this reason, on the other hand others find this a good source of alternate revenue.

Also flyer weight really adds to the typical day. Canada Post letter carriers are not to carry more than 15.9 kilos (35 lbs) at any given time. However, because flyers are not in the mathematical formula, they have been exempted from the weight formulation. For example, the typical letter carrier at Christmas can be carrying 15.9 kilos of mail, and required to carry an additional amount of flyers which combined with regular mail can easily weigh over 22.73 kilos (50 lbs) at any given time.

Letter Carriers are given on average 1.5 to 2.5 hours per day to sort and organize all their mail items. This includes bundling all mail items and putting them into relay bags. These relay bags are then marked for delivery to a relay box on the letter carriers route. These are the neutral grey boxes one sees by many corners or near apartments. These relay bags are delivered by a driver.

When a letter carrier has finished a block, he or she goes to the relay box, empties the contents from the relay bag into the satchel and goes on to the next block or apartment etc. This can be repeated 6-12 times on a typical day.

There are many ways a letter carrier can get to his route. First of all, if the route is close enough to his or her postal station, one can walk. If it is kind-of-close, Canada Post will pay for the bus ride to and from the walk. If it is getting pretty far, Canada Post will pay the taxi fare. Canada Post has a policy of paying for gas if one uses their own personal vehicle for getting back and forth, but there are some caveats to this, so few take advantage of that. Many however, use their own cars at their own cost because of convenience and time savings.

Many letter carriers are miffed at why Canada Post paid for employees to have a new corporate vehicle along with company gas when this was supplied pro-bono by the employee in the past.

Letter Carriers traditionally do not deliver parcels. A unit called UTS, a motorized unit, specifically deals with parcel pick-ups and drop-offs.

All the mail sorted by the letter carrier is typically combined. That is, the oversize, non-machinable, and machinable letter mail and anything else that will fit in a sortation case are all harmonized together in one unit. This is the most efficient way.

In the new way, letter carriers are not to sort the machined mail. This is already done by a machine beforehand. The oversize and stuff the machine can’t read, still have to be sorted by hand. This is sorted and collated separately from the machined mail. The letter carrier is then asked to combine them while delivering. The machined mail is to be held on the left hand, and all oversize and non-machined mail is be held on the forearm of the same left arm. The right hand is then to combine them together.

The problem with the two bundle system is that it never calculated two important variables; flyers and environment. The new system requires a large portion of letters carriers to deliver in the dark, the two bundle system makes it more difficult to do this. Looking twice instead of once at an address takes more time. The two bundle system was imported from the United States Postal system where flyers are not an integral part of the job. How would one carry two bundles plus deliver 3-10 sets of collated flyers? There is no easy solution except that it takes longer.

Parcels are added for the modernized letter Carrier to deliver.

The time saved on sorting is theoretically to be added to the time delivering. Canada Post roughly believes an hour of sorting time is saved on every route and typically adds 250 to 400 points of call to each route.

However, because the two bundle system adds an extra two seconds or so to every delivery point, the requirement to deliver all the parcels in the given route, delivering in the dark which increases time between each point of call, loading and unloading a vehicle, driving and parking a corporate vehicle, it severely reduces any time savings that is anticipated.

It will be interesting to see if all these moves actually save any money, or keeps Canada Post in the same economic situation which in the past decade has just been barely breaking even. Canada Post claims they will not turn any profit until 2017. This time however, with so much money fixed into infrastructure cost, rather than having the flexibility of adding or deleting personnel depending on volumes, it is a precarious time in the history of this corporation.

A Social Look at Canada Post

An employee’s observation of Canada Post from a social and relational point of view. Is it healthy or is it lacking?

As a previous employee of a startup advertising business for over ten years, specializing in publishing leadership and time management books, and before that many stints within charitable organizations, the opportunity to work at the Post Office was a god-send. It would be a great place to overcome burn-out, spend time with family, and give time to publishing a book.

Little did I know how completely opposite the Post Office can be when it comes to respect in the workplace.

One must realize that Canada Post is not unlike any other Canadian large corporation which consists of good, hardworking people that want to do their best for both themselves and others around them. Of course there are a few bad apples in any corporation. Canada Post has them too, but not any more than any other company.

However the difference between Canada Post and other similar organizations is their lack of internal mechanisms to solve inter-personal conflicts.

The problems are not just manager to employee but manager to manager, and employee to employee.

Everyone has their stories, but for me five stand out. Firstly, while in the first 3 months as a postal worker, I had an industrial accident with a small forklift. I cried out for help and saw a number of employees 30 meters away. They looked and did nothing. Two finally after a long pause came but said they were hesitant to do so. It was because one of the other senior employees told them not to. “It is not our responsibility,” he told them.

No management official made an official report of the accident and what safety measures could have been done to avoid a similar problem. I shared with the local union leader of the accident, and how no-one wanted to assist and he questioned, “was there any injury?” “No,” I replied. “Then you shouldn’t be talking to me about this.” He refused to discuss anything after that.

On another occasion, a woman was stuck in the freight elevator. She was pressing the alarm button, screaming and pounding the walls to get someone’s attention. The freight elevator sometimes had towering heavy loads. They surrounded the operator with only a shoulder’s breadth to stand in. It was easy to scare almost anyone.

It broke down often, and so the buzzing of the alarm was largely ignored. It was the pounding, and screaming that got my attention. She was panicking and needed someone to assist and tell her everything was going to be OK. It couldn’t come from me because I am an employee who had no power to get the proper tools and people in place. She needed a corporate official to assure her. A supervisor and trainer were nearby at a desk and I notified the supervisor of the problem requiring immediate attention. The supervisor grabbed a walkie-talkie and requested technical services to attend to the elevator and continued on with her conversation with the trainer. Both refused to go to the elevator shaft and re-assure the women of the situation. Technical services did not think it a critical issue and were tardy in their response. The woman was crying. I asked the supervisor again to do something, even talk to the woman. Neither bothered to get up from their seats and attend.

Days after the situation, I placed an official complaint with health and safety about the supervisor’s lack of respect for this employee’s emotional welfare. The person in charge of the investigation concluded, “You said it happened this way, the supervisor said it that way, who am I to believe?” He shrugged his shoulders and walked away.

Managers can be very aggressive and often hostile in their everyday conversation. Sure employees are like this too, but that is to be expected, but managers should be held to a higher standard. For example, one day a group of management staff were gathered around a work area that I needed to get to. Out of respect, I waited until they would move. One of the leaders of this group saw me standing and said in front of the rest, “Charles, why didn’t you f#*!in tell us to get out of the way! Just say f#*!-off and we would move!”In other words, the manager was saying that to be rude and abrasive is an acceptable norm.

On another occasion I asked a superintendant about what appeared to be a peculiar duty that seemed contradictory to the Canada Post corporate manual. He answered in a totally paternal and angered voice, “I am giving you a direct order to to do this!” “But why?” I said and then added, “it appears what you are saying is not in accordance with the manual.”He once again responded, “Because I have told you to.” The intonation and the stern voice insinuated that even questioning is insubordination. I am not here to question, only here to do whatever I am dictated to do.

It turned from what was approached as a sincere dialogue quickly transformed into a confrontation. This was my first conversation with this person and hopefully the last.

An older female letter carrier asked me why a co-worker of mine pretended to kick her in the head. She was coming into work and was passing by this postal clerk who was leaving in the opposite direction after a full-nights work. Although she didn’t know him, she said hello as a king gesture. The man came close to her and replied with a pretend kick to the head. It shocked her and she came to me later asking me why this man would do such a thing. I couldn’t give an answer except that he was strange. We both shrugged our shoulders silently agreeing that Canada Post would do nothing about it.

It seems like an unreachable goal to develop here a culture of respect. However, it can and has been done in certain instances. One supervisor, albeit a new one at the time, whose background is from an entrepreneurial family, took it on her own initiative to establish this culture in her department. On at least one occasion the highest recorded output of machinable mail ever in that department over an 8 hour period occurred under her watchful eye.

This demonstrates that a culture of respect not only gives dignity to everyone but also pays economic dividends.

Because there are no internal mechanisms, sometimes hostile confrontations or reactions become apparent. Other times passive aggression becomes a regular occurrence. Many conflicts are originally trivial in nature, but because they are never addressed, tension grows. Often most forget the original problem and the anger and tension are the only remains that one can recall.

This, in my mind, is the number one issue in Canada Post’s future.

Canada Post and the Cost of Delivery

A serious discrepancy in Canada Post’s 2009 Annual Report on how much it costs to deliver to every point of call.

How can such a large corporation with two external auditors, the Auditor General of Canada and KPMG, make such a major perceived error?

As per requirement by the Canadian Postal Service Charter, Canada Post outlined in its annual report that it delivered to 14,874,358 points of call in that one year period. This is every home, apartment and lobby box, group or community mailbox, postal box, general delivery or rural mailbox combined. They have also provided a breakdown of how much it annually costs to deliver to each point of call:

$253.00: Door to door
$119.00: Apartment or Lobby box
$100.00: Group Mailbox, Community Mailbox, Kiosk
$63.00: Postal Box General Delivery, etc.
$168.00: Rural Mailbox

This averages out to $140.60 per point of call per year. Canada Post stated in its Annual Report that the average was $156.00. Why Canada Post’s average number is higher than the actual math is not known.

Another mathematical problem is the total yearly sum of all these points of call versus Canada Post’s yearly revenue. There is a non-described discrepancy between the two. The sum Canada Post claims to have cost them to deliver to every point of call over a one year period adds up to $2,314,034,142.00 – far short of the $5,840,000,000.00 that Canada Post claimed as the 2009 annual revenue for Canada Post only (not other parts of its ownership such as Purolator and other sub-companies).

This sum includes payments towards the pension plan shortfall according to the Annual Report (page 28). This suggests all expenses are included in this cost breakdown.

Why a difference of $3,525,965,858 billion dollars? If it cost Canada Post over 2.3 billion dollars to deliver the mail, and they have an annual revenue over 5.8 billion, where is the other 3.5 billion going to?

Could it be Canada Post made 3.5 billion dollars in profit? Probably not, other portions of the Annual Report demonstrate a break even or close to loss point.

Canada Post nowhere has given an answer to such a discrepancy.

The current numbers provided by Canada Post on the cost to each point of delivery are useless for any real calculations. It calls into question the rest of the Annual Report as well. Are the numbers in other parts of the document as poorly edited or oblique as this?

A Brief History of Canada’s Postal Transformation

The modernization of Canada Post — an ambitious plan that started with the ideal of being self-funded with little debt has escalated into billions of borrowed funds and now has straddled the company with serious money issues. A total reverse of six years ago when Canada Post had no debt at all. What happened?

It is necessary to delve into the recent history of Canada Post to find the answers.

The 2007 Canada Post Annual Report introduced the framework and official cost of the modern post:

“Over the next five years, we could invest up to $1.9 billion of capital to support these major improvements. This is in addition to the $1.1 billion of capital investment that is needed to support ongoing operations. We will prioritize our investment based on the greatest need and spend only what we can afford.”(1)

It also outlined a general idea of how to accomplish this $3-billion total:

“Funding will also be derived from an employer-contribution holiday to the Canada Post Pension Plan. More than $750 million of supplementary contributions have created a healthy surplus, but financial markets also have an important impact on the valuation of our pension plan and related funding requirements.

To mitigate these risks, Canada Post is reviewing its cost structure and developing contingency plans to ensure our investment plans are prudent and flexible.”(2)

Canada Post was in a positive position with the pension plan. There was no longer any solvency deficiency payments required. This potentially rendered up to $414 million dollars annually for other purposes.(3) The Pension Plan was also in a surplus position and afforded Canada Post a two-year release from making any contributions. This amounted to $270 million over two years.(4) There was projected small annual profits anywhere from $50 to $200 million from the Corporation that could be rolled into the transformation. Plus, if the Federal Government waived its dividend requirement on any profits, (which it later did) this could also generate anywhere from $20 – $60 million annually.

The above are just conjectures of what was available, but it is clear that Canada Post was especially banking on what they believed was $750 million savings from Pension monies for Postal Transformation, believing that this would provide the necessary funding for the first two critical years:

“Based on the assessment of these factors, it is expected that the Corporation will have sufficient liquidity and will not need to borrow in 2008 or 2009 to meet planned commitments and investments.”(5)

These savings for 2007 were to be the self-funding catalyst for postal transformation. It is not clear how the money would be financed after 2009.

It was a risky and aggressive approach. Sean Silcoff of the Financial Postwarned in 2008 that this may be too aggressive and a cash reserve should be created in case the financial markets changed:

“But volatile markets mean Ms. Greene may need to conserve cash in case there is a shortfall in the post office’s pension plan. Ms. Greene inherited a $1.4-billion plan deficit when she joined in 2005. That was gradually whittled down by rising markets and $719-million in special contributions.”(6)

The enormous burden of the pension plan was also the subject of Ms. Louise Thibault’s question in a June 22nd, 2006 Parliamentary standing committee. She asked Moya Greene, then President of Canada Post, if the company had a rationalization plan. Moya Greene replied, “No, we have no such plan. Such decisions are made naturally, as the situation evolves.”(7)

There was no public consultation on the modernization plan, nor was a detailed business plan introduced. They did not answer basic questions such as, why would you invest so much money, equipment and infrastructure now in a sector that has decreasing volumes? If Canada Post was a private company and presented a business plan with a projected loss of 1.7% yearly in volume, would shareholders invest in such an upgrade plan? This question and many more have been posited for well over four years, and still remain unanswered.

Canada Post, being a crown corporation, is only accountable to one shareholder, not like publicly traded companies whose business plans are heavily scrutinized by public investors. Canada Post’s only shareholder is the Federal Government and is not required to publicly open its business plan. It is also at arms length from the Federal Government. It historically has been a regular generator of small profits and a yearly dividend to the Government, because of this, it has been allowed to chart its own course.

In 2008 the markets crashed. It put Canada Post into a $2-billion dollar pension shortfall. Growth was no longer in the 5% but in the negatives. There was no money for the transformation. There was no cash reserved for such a premise to occur either.

Financial and lease commitments had already been made. Canada Post was caught unprepared. Federal law stipulated the corporation could only borrow up to $300-million dollars and the commitment to the transformation was pushing this limit

Costs for the Modernization had also risen considerably over the one-year period. The 2008 Annual Report came up with higher figures:

“Over the next five years, investment of up to $2.7 billion, including $2.3 billion of capital expenditures, would be needed to support Postal Transformation. This amount is in addition to almost $1 billion of capital investment needed to support ongoing operations.”(8)

The total was now over $3.7-billion dollars instead of $3 billion.

In addressing a parliamentary committee, Moya Greene stated that it could go to $4-billion dollars:

“I am looking at us spending $2 billion to $2.5 billion to modernize the facility and to help our people adapt to change, and I am looking at us probably having to commit another $1 billion to the pension. Therefore, I am looking at us managing close to between $3.5 billion and $4 billion worth of liability.”(9)

The initial response was to curtail the Postal Transformation until additional sources of funding could be found:

“Given the current economic climate, we intend to monitor our financial position closely and adjust spending as needed. Current commitments over the five-year plan period have been limited to the most critical investments, which are expected to total $750 million until we can ensure adequate financing.”(10)

The initial solutions considered were twofold. The Canada Post Corporation Strategic Review recommended that Canada Post, as a crown corporation, “should be either exempted from funding solvency deficits or the government should agree to guarantee payment for any such deficit.” This would relieve between $250 to $500 million annually. They also recommended that Canada Post have an increased borrowing limit.(11)

Canada Post went even further. They directly addressed the Minister of Finance. On March 16th, 2009, Moya Greene, CEO of Canada Post wrote a letter to the Hon. Jim Flaherty, Minister of Finance to “Exempt federal Crown Corporations from solvency deficit rules,” and the second option was to change the way defined benefit plans work.(12) Ms. Greene was looking for a way to not immediately re-pay the pension shortfall so that the money could be used for the transformation. A reply to this request has not been found but it must have obviously been turned down.

Ms. Greene then tried a second approach. According to a Toronto Star writer and ex-CEO of Canada Post, Michael Warren, she went to Stephen Harper to ask permission for Canada Post to partially privatize in order that she could arrange funding. She was denied.(13)

The borrowing limit was officially increased. In December 2009, it was extended to $2.5-billion dollars.(14) In July, 2010 Canada Post issued a $1-billion bond debt issue, which were snatched up fast because they were backed by the Government of Canada.(15) They have also established a $400-million-dollar credit facility (16). The Federal Government also allowed Canada Post to borrow up to $500 million from the Government’s Consolidated Revenue fund.(17)

In 2011, the pension shortfall payment methodology has also been changed. This was not done specifically for Canada Post but for all Federally regulated pension funds under the same financial pressures. This has alleviated significant monies having to annually be contributed to the pension shortfall.(18)

The 2007 and 2008 Annual Reports do not cite labour costs as a critical factor to control in regards to its financial outlook. Contrary, it envisioned that “Anticipated benefits will be achieved through leveraging the coming wave of attrition, as close to one-third of our employees become eligible for retirement within ten years.”(19) A high number of these positions were to be eliminated. This was where a large portion of the savings were to come from.

During the midst of this crisis, Moya Greene resigned on May 27, 2010(20) and moved over to the Royal Mail in Britain to lead their transformation. There is no reference in any Canadian political or business journal that she was compelled or forced to leave over the handling of the upgrade and neglecting to have cash-reserves in the business plan.

Canada Post continues to proceed on transformation, though it has begun to pull-back in the full expenditure. The Summary of 2010-2014 Corporate Plan by Canada Post states that it has reduced transformation expenditures $1.1 billion less than planned. $2 billion instead of $3.1 billion but failed to give any specifics.

“Our financial experience in 2009 has also caused us to re-prioritize the next phase of PT. In addition to dealing with obsolescence we also plan to focus on the critical investments and those with the highest return on investment. We have revised our investment to $2 billion overall, $1.1 billion less than last year’s Plan.”(21)

Canada Post cited its first official loss after 16 years of consecutive profits in its 2011 Annual Report. It cited four main factors for the loss: eroding mail volumes, pension liabilities, the rotating strikes and subsequent lockout, and labour costs. Mail volumes were already eroding before the transformation began, this is not a valid argument. They knew there were great risks associated with using allocated pension money, but failed to build-up cash reserves for a just-in-case scenario. They knew this was a huge risk and lost. Labour costs were not an initial concern at the beginning because at least 16 to 20 percent of positions were going to be eliminated through attrition. The cost savings alone from this would propel the transformation into a profit position. However, the combination of the pension losses, eroding mail volumes, the higher-than anticipated costs of Postal Transformation, and high debt, has caused Canada Post to focus on severely cutting current labour costs.

The above are true contributors, but the problem of poor initial planning needs to be included in Canada Post’s recent history and is suspiciously absent.

Michael Warren, a former CEO of Canada Post from 1981-1985, believes that there is a lack of a clear plan and this may bring on future financial problems. In a Toronto Star article, The Future of Canada Post,he argues that there are serious inherent problems with the plan:

“The larger concern is that Canadian taxpayers are being asked to guarantee a multi-billion-dollar investment in a process that lacks a clear, long-term business plan.

If these billions are simply intended to speed up the processing of hard-copy letter mail to add some efficiency to today’s unsustainable postal business model, then they will be wasted. This money will also be wasted if the government allows Canada Post to indulge in its costly vision of a separate e-post electronic service when the Internet is readily available.”(22)

The story of Canada Post’s postal transformation from a financial perspective is not over yet. As more information comes to light, this website will be updated.

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(1) Canada Post 2007 Annual Report. This was repeated at least two other times in the report. See also Pg. 4 and Pg. 52
(2) Canada Post 2007 Annual Report. Pg. 5
(3) Canada Post 2007 Annual Report. Pg. 59
(4) Canada Post 2007 Annual Report. Pg. 59
(5) Canada Post 2007 Annual Report. Pg. 61
(6) http://www.financialpost.com/related/topics/Volatility+Canada+Post+upgrades+hold/464307/story.html
(7) Louise Thibault’s question and answer with Moya Green at the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates EVIDENCE CONTENTS Thursday, June 22, 2006
(8) Canada Post 2008 Annual Report. Pg. 38
(9) Moya Greene’ s presentation at the Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on National Finance Issue 4 – Evidence – April 27, 2010
(10) Canada Post 2008 Annual Report. Pg. 38
(11) Submission to the Strategic Review. Canada Post: A Blueprint for Change. September 2nd, 2008. Pg. 4
(12) http://www.docstoc.com/docs/53877461/The-Honourable-Jim-Flaherty-PC-MP-Minister-of-Finance
(13) The Future of Canada Post, August 9, 2010
(14) http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/aboutus/news/pr/2010/2010_jan_special_report.jsf
(15) http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/aboutus/news/pr/2010/2010_july_debt.jsf, see also http://business.financialpost.com/2010/07/07/demand-high-for-canada-post-bond-offering/
(16) http://www.ogilvyrenault.com/en/clientWork_10520.htm
(17) Canada Post Annual Report Pg. 120 http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/assets/pdf/aboutus/annualreport/Consolidated_Financial_Statements.pdf
(18) 2011 Canada Post Annual Report. Pg. 49
(19) Canada Post 2008 Annual Report. Pg. 38
(20) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moya_Greene
(21) The quote taken from the following link has been removed from the public domain: http://extranet.canadapost.ca/html/documents/ar_summaries/2010_2014_corporateplan-e.pdf Page. 6. However, the same sentiment can be found at: http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/assets/pdf/aboutus/annualreport/Management_Discussion_and_Analysis.pdf Pg. 38 “Our financial position and operations in 2009 have caused us to re-prioritize the next phase of Postal Transformation. We have revised our total project investment plan downward to $2 billion.”
(22)https://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/2010/08/09/the_future_of_canada_post.html

First published February 22, 2011. Revised June 17, 2013

What exactly are the billions for?

Moya Greene, as then CEO of Canada Post, made a startling financial disclosure on what some of the billions of dollars Canada Post was requesting and collecting was for – and it was not just for modernization.

In an April 27th, 2010 representation on behalf of Canada Post to the Standing Senate Committee on National Finance, she disclosed that some of the monies was for the pension deficit, management buyouts, and assembling a new corporate credit structure. She also projected the total amount of monies needed would be higher – up from the original 1.7 billion estimate, which was later changed to 2.7 billion and now suggests around 4 billion.

Ms. Greene state before the committee, “I am looking at us spending $2 billion to $2.5 billion to modernize the facility and to help our people adapt to change, and I am looking at us probably having to commit another $1 billion to the pension. Therefore, I am looking at us managing close to between $3.5 billion and $4 billion worth of liability.”(1)

When asked more closely, she was asked if some of the money was for management buyouts. She concurred but did not have the exact figures available.

She also felt confused that Canada Post has not historically carried a level of debt and believed that this should change, “There is a permanent level of debt that a company this size should be carrying, and it is not $300 million. It should be at least $1 billion dollars.”(2)

Since this conversation Canada Post has completed the first round of issuing bonds for 1 billion dollars and has established a $4oo-million dollar credit facility with the Toronto Dominion Bank and the Royal Bank of Canada.(3)