Canada Post no longer raising flag to indicate mail in rural areas

Some rural residents say they’ve been told by Canada Post that mail carriers won’t raise the flag on their mailbox anymore. CTV’s Katie Griffin reports.

For decades, residents living in rural areas around eastern Ontario could tell they had mail delivered if the flag on their mailbox was up.

Now, they’re being told Canada Post delivery agents will no longer raise the flag because that was never what the indicator was meant for in the first place.

“Whether it’s to save time or money, I’m not sure, but it’s not doing the workers nor the corporation any good,” said David Carriere.

• Sign up now for daily CTV News Ottawa newsletters
• The information you need to know, sent directly to you: Download the CTV News App

Carriere received a letter from Canada Post indicating delivery agents would no longer raise the signal device on the mailboxes when mail is delivered.

“And it seems a little bit odd that given a time when Canada Post is struggling to survive and wanting large raises and wanting to gain more of the market share that they’re going to offer less service and less convenience to the public when they deliver their mail,” Carriere said.

A resident in Summerstown, Ont. received a handwritten note from a carrier that said they would no longer be allowed to raise the flag.

“So sorry. Please check box regularly,” the note said.

“The purpose of the Signal Device/Red Flag on rural mailboxes is for customers to inform the delivery agents there is outgoing mail to be picked up from the mailbox,” Canada Post wrote in a statement. “The red flag is not meant for delivery agents to inform customers that mail has been put in the mailbox. We recognize that some delivery agents use it for that purpose, but it is out of courtesy. It is not a national delivery process.”

Carriere said most people take outgoing mail to the post office and that it doesn’t make sense to stop doing something that had been done for decades.

“My laneway is only 150 feet long, it’s not a huge deal if I make an extra trip, but a lot of people here have a half-mile laneway… they look out, they don’t see a flag, they don’t go out,” he said. “A lot of these people are older, and it takes some effort to go out and get that mail.”