TRURO - Restructuring at Canada Post will see some residents in the Truro/Bible Hill area receiving their mail later in the day and possibly dealing with new carriers, a union official says.
"Because the routes have been redone, carriers may be in different areas and starting at different times," said Bobbi Jo Brown, secretary/treasurer with Truro Local 132 of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW).
"And people who normally may have gotten their mail in the morning because of the way it used to be set up may now not get their mail until the afternoon because of the way the new route is set up."
After conducting a mail count over a two-week period, Brown said, Canada Post reduced the carrier routes in the Truro/Bible Hill area from 23 to 20.
"So the routes get bigger (for individual carriers)," she said.
No rural routes are affected by the change.
The route reduction also means two full-time and one part-time positions will be eliminated. However, a corporation spokesperson said no one will actually lose their job through the process.
Although an affected individual may get bumped out of their position on a seniority basis, they would retain their full pay as relief workers who could eventually recover a route through attrition.
"If it is a Canada Post employee they would have job security so they would be assigned somewhere else," said spokeswoman Anick Losier from Ottawa.
"But these people would have a job. Essentially we don't fire people for restructuring because they have job security as part of the collective agreement," she said. "They have iron-clad job security (for life) unless they steal."
And Losier said the restructuring is based on mail volume counts that have declined on average by 20 per cent per address over the past five years.
"Because mail has been declining ... in some cases they (the carriers) will do longer routes but they will deliver less."
Brown says that isn't always the case, however, and while she can appreciate the corporation's business perspective of trying to improve efficiencies, she said cost-saving measures should not have to come on the backs of the carriers.
"Because when they do a restructure it never benefits the worker," she said.
