Is Canada Post on strike? Status and what to do
Canada Post's labour status today, what happened in the 2024 and 2025 strikes, and how a business can keep shipping if service stops again.
Updated
Short answer. No. As of October 11, 2026, Canada Post is operating normally. Members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers ratified new contracts on June 1, 2026, the agreements were signed on June 18, and they run to January 31, 2029. Canada Post’s service alerts list no labour disruption.
Where things stand
The Canadian Union of Postal Workers voted to accept agreements for both of its Canada Post units. Urban postal operations voted 89.39% in favour and rural and suburban mail carriers 86.58%, in results audited on June 15, 2026. A separate union of supervisors and sales staff, APOC, ratified its own agreement on September 21, 2026, running to March 31, 2030.
With contracts in place until 2029, a national postal strike before then would be unusual. Canada Post’s holiday guidelines and its new weekend parcel delivery in Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal are going ahead as planned.
The disputes of 2024 and 2025
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| Nov 15, 2024 | National strike. Canada Post stopped accepting new items. |
| Dec 17, 2024 | Operations restarted after a Canada Industrial Relations Board ruling; parcels accepted again from December 19. |
| Jan 6, 2025 | On-time guarantees reinstated for domestic parcels. |
| May 23, 2025 | The union began a national overtime ban. Canada Post kept operating. |
| Aug 1, 2025 | Employees voted to reject Canada Post’s final offers. |
| Sept 25, 2025 | Second national strike. New items not accepted and guarantees suspended. |
| Oct 11, 2025 | The union moved to rotating strikes and employees returned. |
| Nov 21, 2025 | Agreements in principle; strike and lockout activity suspended. |
| Dec 22, 2025 | Tentative agreements reached. |
| June 1, 2026 | Members ratified the agreements, which run to January 31, 2029. |
What a strike does to parcels
In both national strikes, Canada Post stopped taking new mail and parcels, and parcels already in its network sat until work resumed. Delivery guarantees were affected in 2024 and suspended in 2025.
The couriers felt it too. In December 2024, with Canada Post’s volume moving to them, CBC reported that Purolator and UPS paused shipments from some courier companies to catch up, and FedEx limited retail drop-offs to five packages per visit. UPS added a demand surcharge to every parcel in its Canadian network from December 8 and suspended on-call pickups for UPS Standard. Switching carriers in the middle of a strike works, but it takes time and costs more.
How to be ready for the next one
- Have a courier set up before you need it. Opening accounts during a strike is slower, and in 2024 some couriers were turning new business away.
- Know which of your customers only Canada Post reaches. Couriers don’t deliver to PO boxes or general delivery, so those addresses wait until Canada Post is back.
- Watch Canada Post’s labour updates page. Strikes follow a 72-hour notice, which gives you a few days to move parcels to another carrier.
- Expect couriers to slow down and add charges while their volume spikes, and tell customers about delays early.
ProtonShip puts four couriers in one account, and Canada Post is coming soon, so a disruption at one carrier means choosing another service in the same quote rather than opening a new account. See the carriers
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