A Visit to the Post Office

I am so sick and tired of phoning Government agencies or Departments and not being able to get past an answering macine that more than likely will give me message choices that don't have anything to do with what I want. The other day we had to ship a document to Ottawa that needed a next morning delivery. Because it was a government tender we needed to use Canada Post instead of Fedex or one of the other parcel Companies. Now we don't use them often so I thought the reasonable thing to do was to call them and find out the procedure, pickup, delivery policy etc.

If you want to use Fedex or Purolator when you call them they will ask for your phone number or Postal Code which links to your account number, if you don't have an account they set one up for you, only takes a minute. So I pick up in the phone book, the first thing you find out is that the Post Office doen't identify themselves as Canada Post, now in the PEI phone book there are twenty courier services listed. So if you don't know that the Canada Post service is called Priority Courier you better get your dialing finger warmed up, but before you start take a Valium you are going to need it.

So I dial Priority Post and get a message something like, do you want English or French and I press the # 1 for English, and then get a message that greets me and says that my call may be monitored to ensure quality, Ok I have no trouble with that because I really think that the Post Office should offer quality service, after a pause we move on to the message, "most of our services are closed for the day" a pause, but I can press # 1 if I am a business, now we are getting somewhere.

So I do the # 1 thing and am then asked to enter my Account number. This is about what I expected, now as we haven't used Canada Post as our Courier service we don't have an account number so the logical thing in my mind is that I will next set one up over the phone or be told how I do it.

A voice activates and tells me to press # 1 to return to the previous menu or the "star" to correct an entry, I am just a tad confused but comply. Here is what I am thinking, probably I didn't listen to all the options at the previous menu, and instead of pressing # 1 because I am a business I should have stayed on the line longer. Sure enough, the same voice tells me I can Press # 2 if you are a residence, I wait, nothing else except a repeat of the 2 options. I stupidly try #1 again and get onto the merry go round. There is no way you can actually speak to a human being or find an option that will explain this account thing, what the f??? are they doing, trying to move my blood pressure to a level where I won't survive to bother them again.
OK, we have to use Canada Post in this instance so I trot off down to the Post Office to find out about an account.

"Hello"I say "how do I open an account so I can ship some documents to Ottawa", the guy at the counter says "$22.50", no explanation just "$22.50". I freeze for a second as I process the answer to my question, I come to the conclusion it is going to cost me $22.50 and the other counter person says to me, "How often do you ship things?"

Now this is a bit more like it, conversation, it doesn't answer my question about the account but I determine this is a bit more promising source of information than Mr. dollars and cents. I turn and reply "about 3 -4 times a year". "He doesn't need an account" the first guy says, "but maybe he wants one" the other person says.

The first guy looks at me, produces a big envelope and ignoring the other counter person tells me "that'll be $22.50. I am starting to understand why Postal workers turn on themselves and gun each other down, there is definitely tension in the air and I quickly decide I don't want to be around these two when the pistols come out.

Suddenly they are both speaking at once and over the course of the next few minutes I get a lot of information as they compete for my ear. End of story, I pay my $22.50, get the envelope and leave understanding that if I return it to the Post office before 3:30 pm that day it will be delivered before 10am in Ottawa tomorrow.

Now what if I wasn't in Charlottetown but maybe was 20 miles in the country. I would have had to drive into town to discover I didn't need an account to ship something, but could have an account if I wanted one, but I would have to go to a main postal outlet, fill out an application and after a period of time would either be approved or declined I guess.

Couldn't they have had an option that said "if you don't have an acount or can't remember your account number press # 3. Don't get me going because this is only minor compared to what you get at Veterans Affairs or Canada Pensions.