Canada Post says mail and parcel movement will restart on Saturday, October 11 at 6 a.m. local time as postal workers shift from a nationwide shutdown to rotating walkouts — ending roughly two weeks of a full stoppage that began September 25. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) says the rotating strikes are meant to keep pressure on management while allowing items to move again.
Operationally, the Crown corporation is warning businesses to brace for delays. Canada Post has suspended all on‑time delivery guarantees, will prioritize clearing trapped volume already in its network, and — crucially for commercial shippers — will not accept new bulk volumes until Wednesday, October 15. The carrier also hasn’t disclosed which plants or depots will be hit by local strike rotations, making disruptions inherently rolling and location‑specific.
For trucking and parcel carriers feeding Canada Post, that means linehaul schedules into injection points may need daily adjustments as facilities toggle between operating and strike status. Expect uneven pull‑through at plants early in the week as weekend processing restarts and depots refill. Cross‑border carriers hauling U.S. e‑commerce freight into Canada Post’s network should coordinate closely with consolidators and 3PLs to avoid dwell at impacted terminals and to sequence tenders around the Oct. 15 intake restart. (Analysis)
The strategic shift follows a Thursday meeting between CUPW and the federal minister responsible for Canada Post, with a follow‑up session expected next week. The union’s province‑by‑province rotations begin at 6 a.m. in each time zone; local branches will be notified ahead of their strike window.
Context for shippers: the move comes after Ottawa unveiled plans to overhaul Canada Post’s business model — changes CUPW argues would cut jobs and reduce service — triggering the September 25 walkout by more than 55,000 workers. With parcel competition intensifying and letter volumes eroding, the dispute has become a tug‑of‑war over how the postal network balances universal service with financial reality.
Canada Post, for its part, says the past year has already brought more than 170 days of strike activity across various actions, pushing business to competitors and worsening the company’s finances — and that rotating strikes will prolong uncertainty for customers. The corporation says it will provide more detail for commercial mailers ahead of Wednesday’s broader re‑acceptance of volume.
What shippers can do now: hold non‑urgent B2C mailstreams that rely on Canada Post induction until after Oct. 15; pre‑alert customers to sliding ETAs by region; segment urgent parcels to alternative last‑mile carriers where available; and for cross‑border flows, stage freight closer to major Canadian urban gateways to reduce linehaul waste if a local depot rotates back into strike. Expect clearing the initial backlog to take several days, with day‑to‑day conditions hinging on which facilities are struck at a given time. (Analysis)
Sources: FreightWaves, Reuters, Canada Post, The Canadian Press
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