Rent a P.O. box, Canada Post tells mail theft victim
A victim of mail theft in Surrey, who has been asking Canada Post to find a secure way to deliver her mail, is outraged after the corporation suggested she rent a P.O. box.
"I'm angry and I'm really frustrated," Jeannette Bellrichard told CBC News on Friday. "It's like me as a citizen, I don't know where to go next."
On Thursday Bellrichard told CBC News someone has been breaking into her community mailbox and stealing mail from her neighbourhood for years, including one $10,000 cheque, bank and tax documents and her daughter's credit card.
On Friday, Bellrichard said Canada Post suggested she rent a post office mail box to solve the problem.
But the suggestion only fueled her outrage, because according to Canada Post's website a standard private mail box costs as much as $172 a year.
"So what does that mean? Does that mean you pay money out of pocket?" Bellrichard told CBC News.
"I have to pay money out of my pocket and go and pick up my mail at the local drug store where there's a post office?"
Bellrichard says insteady of her paying for a P.O. box in a post office, she wants Canada Post to move her community mailbox to a safer location, like they have done for others who have been targeted by thieves.
Residents in the Maple Ridge neighbourhood of Academy Park say their community mailbox was broken into a few times before Canada Post moved it from a secluded area to a more visible spot.
Canada Post says there are no plans to reduce the use of community mailboxes. The corporation argues community boxes are safer than mail that sits unlocked in individual boxes in front of people's homes.
