Canada Post provides various services to its customers. It offers Canadian forces postal service, Express Post, mail forwarding service, etc. One of the best services of this post is hold mail service. In this article, you will get to know about request a hold mail, buying a hold mail and how long does the post office hold mail? Mostly people don’t know Canada Post hold mail service and how it works. We’ll discuss it in our upcoming paragraph, keep reading this article:
Contents
What Is Hold Mail?
Hold Mail is a service provided by Canada Postal service. This service is for those people who are away from home or business and have to worry about knowing their mail. Their important mail is stored in secured Canada Post location to keep it safe and prevent it from collecting in the mailbox. They can apply for hold mail request to reduce their worry about important mail. Many Postal services organizations provide hold mail service but Canada Post hold mail service is the best in whole Canada country. We will discuss how to put mail on hold, further in the article. Keep reading this article:
How to put a hold on mail?
Everyone needs vacations for spending their precious time with their family and friends. In that case, they have to move away from home or business and have to worry about their important mail. Now, you can use Canada postal mail hold service to keep safe your important mail. It is a paid service offered by Canada Post. You have to purchase hold mail service for residential or business from Canada Post portal or to visit their nearest post office.
If you are going to buy Canada Post hold mail online or at the post office, you will need government-approved photo identification and a letter of authorization (a document that allows you to act on the behalf of another person or business to use this service or to pick up a mail).
Examples of some acceptable govt. photo ID are:
- Canadian Forces Identity card
- Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB) ID card*
- Canadian/Foreign Passport
- Certificate of Indian Status Card
- Driver’s license (Canadian / Foreign)
- Firearm Acquisition / Firearm Possession card
- Health card with photo, where not prohibited
- Permanent Resident card
- Provincial / Territorial Identification card
A letter of authorization includes:
- The printed name
- Signature of the Addressee (an individual)
- A list of name(s) and signature(s) of anyone authorized to act on their behalf.
Buy hold mail online:
The maximum limit of buying hold mail at the same address is up to 4 people. It is only an individual. You can’t include any business name in your residential hold mail request. You have to buy the Hold Mail service at least 5 business days before you want your mail to be held. After buying this service, it will be activated 3 business days after you applied for service.
You have to enter your address and identification information in hold mail form to apply for this service. After that, you’ll see an option to choose the hold start and end dates. In the last, you have to pay for this service with your credit card. You will be charged $21.50 for up to 2 weeks per household* + each additional week is $10.60 and adding a particular name is $3 for residential. It takes $44 for up to 1 week* + each additional weekday is $8.80 and adding a particular name is $3 for business. You have to fill a form to avail of this service. For your easy understanding, we have shown a table of Canada Post hold mail cost. You can check hold mail rates according to your convenience.
| Category | Prices | |
|---|---|---|
| Residential | $22.75 for 10 weekdays* or less | $11.25 per additional 5 weekdays |
| Additional name** | $4.00 | |
| Business | $46.75 for 5 weekdays* or less | $9.30 per additional weekday |
| Additional Individual name** | $4.00 | |
If you want to apply to request a hold mail, you have to fill a form online or offline. It is a process that takes a little bit of time. You don’t have to worry about that. The online form format will be as shown below:
Buy hold mail at a post office:
The first thing you need to do is fill out an order form at home to save time at the post office. After that, you have to visit your nearest post office to submit it. There you will be asked to show your identification and form, then you pay the fees. You can see the format of the offline hold mail form below or you can download it to place mail on hold.
How long does the post office hold mail?
After reading the above paragraph, one question may arise your mind is how long does the post office hold mail? Canada Post holds a mail to 2 weeks/15 days. After expiring your hold mail request, you can purchase hold mail again online or at the post office. To purchase this service again, you will need a reference no. from receipt or from the confirmation email Canada Post sent to you when you placed your order before. Canada Post doesn’t hold these items:
- Parcels (for example XpresspostTM or Regular ParcelTM)
- Prepaid envelopes
- Newspapers and flyers delivered by other parties
Cancel Hold Mail:
Canada Post offers easy cancellation for customer’s sake. They can extend, modify, and cancel hold mail delivery at any time easily. It’s easy to cancel its service online if you provided an email address when you bought it. All you need is a reference number from the confirmation mail Canada Post sent when you purchased hold mail service. If you bought hold mail service by visiting the nearest post office and didn’t provide any email, then you need to visit again that post office to cancel hold mail service. All you need is to show one piece of original, valid, government-issued photo ID. The 8 digit reference number found on the receipt given by the post office or in your email.
Note: Canada Post and its authorized agents will not be responsible for any direct and indirect damage of a package. It’s a strict rule that you can’t claim for any liability coverage.