Canada Post is gearing up to deliver the best—and busiest—holiday season ever!

An Open Letter to Canadians

OTTAWA, Oct. 15, 2013 /CNW/ - Last December, something special happened at Canada Post: for the first time we delivered more than one million parcels… in a single day. It was a historic milestone that we hit… twice. This parcel boom is because more and more Canadians are flocking to e-commerce. So this season, we're getting ready to deliver what we expect will be even more of your holiday parcels. And we're going to do it better than ever—because we know you love this time of year, and we love it, too.

As we hit our peak season over the next two months, we have our eye on two very special days: December 17, which we anticipate will be our busiest processing day. And December 20, the day we project we'll deliver more than 1.5 million packages—the largest volume for a single day in Canada since mail delivery began.

No one else in the country is as dedicated to ensuring your gifts are delivered on time and we're pulling out all the stops to make it happen. Here's what we're going to do—and have been doing—to deliver Canadians the best holiday season yet:

• Starting in mid-November, we'll be delivering your items every day of the week, including weekends! If you have a question during the weekend, our customer service will be standing by to answer them all;
• If you are not home, we'll leave you a note and you can pick up your item at one of almost 6,400 conveniently located postal outlets. In fact, almost 80% of the Canadian population live within 2.5 km of a postal counter;
• We've improved our scanning like never before - please download our popular mobile applications or come on line and check our tracking system that includes the capability to ask questions online about your product;
• We created the Canada Post E-commerce Innovation Awards, which are dedicated entirely to recognizing and supporting great Canadian online retail. Check out this year's winners and finalists for some amazing and unique Christmas gift ideas—whoever said Canadian e-commerce was behind the times was… misinformed.

As for our employees—they're ready to go:

• More than 21,000 service reps at almost 6,400 post offices across the country (the largest delivery network in Canada) geared up to serve you, our customers.
• 12,500 employees at our processing plants standing by to sort, distribute and ship your packages, armed with modernized equipment and the latest scan technology.
• 28,000 delivery personnel committed to getting your holiday parcel to your doorstep or community mailbox on time and hassle-free.
• Our digital team will work hard to make sure our website and our mobile app are serving your postal needs, 24/7.
• And we'd also like to mention our transportation network: Each day, we will travel more than 1.5 million kilometres with an increasing number of fuel efficient vehicles because though we love the holidays, we love the Earth, too.

We know it's only October. But for us, the holidays start now. We're proud and excited to serve you, our customers. And we're proud and excited to be Delivering the Online World.

SOURCE: Canada Post