May 8, 2010

(Letter sent to the editor of the Winnipeg Free Press)

Dear Editor:

I am writing in response to an article that ran in the Saturday edition of the Winnipeg Free Press: High-tech gremlins delay mail, union says.

First, I want to reassure the people of Winnipeg and Manitoba they can continue to count on Canada Post to deliver the mail. We are changing the way we operate in Winnipeg, but that doesn’t change our strong commitment to serving our customers.

The article gave an unfortunate view of the progress we are making in our transition from our 50 year old downtown facility to the new Mail Processing Plant at the Winnipeg Airport. The new Plant is the first of its kind in Canada, incorporates the very latest in technology and is the most modern postal operation in the world today. Once fully operational, it will employ over 400 people and allow us to better serve the people of Winnipeg and Manitoba for many years to come.

As with any major operational and technical change, we are taking our time to do it right and anticipated that start-up challenges would occur as we work through the transition. That’s why we are implementing the changes in carefully-planned phases, continuously monitoring our progress and quickly responding to any challenges that arise. We are only two weeks into a process that will continue for several months and are already seeing 99% accuracy on some of our new sequencing equipment. As planned, we will continue to move mail between the old and new plants as we work through the transition. This is just common sense for any major move and will ensure regular and timely delivery of the mail.

Our employees take a lot of pride in providing excellent service to our customers and we couldn’t be more proud of the care and hard work they are putting into the transition to the new plant.

In closing, we are making major changes to our operations, which is never easy. With only 2 weeks under our belt, we’re pleased with the progress we’re seeing. While some may wish to focus on the types of start up issues you would expect during a transition of this size, we’ll focus our efforts on making this new plant a postal leader in Canada and around the world.

Bill Davidson
General Manager, Canada Post