Recently, there was an article in the local newspaper about our local MPP being incredulous that Canada Post postal works suddenly cannot deliver mail to Rural Route addresses. (RR# - essentially just large geographical areas assigned to mail carriers who deliver mail, by vehicle, to mailboxes at the end of peoples' lane ways.) Instead of delivering this mail in the same manner as they have been for the past 100 years or so, they have started returning letters back to the sender as 'address unknown'.
Our politician, who is speaking for the people (after having received a number of complaints), has a point. After all, what has changed between yesterday and today that has caused the mail carriers to suddenly forget where 'Mr & Mrs Smith of RR2 Somewhereville' live?
The thing is, a Civic Address System, (a process of naming all the roads in the County, and assigning numbers to every property), was put into place in this area close to 10 years ago. At that time Canada Post told us that they would eventually expect those civic addresses to become part of the daily mailing routine. Now they're following up on that, and people are surprised, shocked and angry. ...gasp...
Realizing that I send out a lot of mail from my office to RR addresses, (a large majority of people in the area have these addresses), it is possible that I could suddenly be flooded with returned mail - costing me time, and my employer money. So I did what any good bookkeeper would do, wrote up an 'addressing 101' memo, and emailed it to the staff. Here it is for you:
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The rules for properly addressing an envelope have changed over the years; Canada Post has an extensive addressing guideline which can be found here:
http://www.canadapost.ca/tools/pg/manual/PGaddress-e.asp
Here are the basics:
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Use ALL CAPITAL LETTERS. For the name, street address, province, postal code - everything.
example:
AMY BEIRNES
ST MARYS CHURCH
554 THIS ST E
TOWN ON N4K 1X3
(make sure to include
one space between the town and province;
two spaces between the province and the postal code; and
one space between the first 3 digits of the postal code and the last 3 digits)
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DO NOT use punctuation (unless it is part of a proper name ie: LION'S HEAD)
example:
Don't do this: R.R.#2. Instead, write it like this: RR 2 (make sure to include one space between 'RR' and the number)
Don't do this:
842 2nd St. S., Apt. #2.
Instead, write it like this:
842 2ND ST S APT 2 Or like this:
2 - 842 2ND ST S (either way is acceptable)
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Civic Addresses (or street addresses) are written on the line above rural route or PO Box addresses.
example:
AMY BEIRNES
623460 REALLY LONG RD NAME RD
RR 2
TOWN ON N0H 1B0
or:
AMY BEIRNES
123 LOUKES LANE
PO BOX 123
TOWN ON N0V 1E0
This example, (with only the rural route listed):
AMY BEIRNES
RR 2
TOWN ON N0V 1R0
will likely be returned to you as 'unknown address'.
You MUST include the civic address.
This is especially important in our area as many, many people live on rural routes. If someone gives you a rural route number as an address, ask that person for the full civic address.
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The Town, Province, and Postal Code all go on the same line. Always.
example:
TOWN ON N4K 1X3
Remember to put 2 spaces between the province abbreviation and the postal code.
If you are sending mail out of the country, the country name goes under this line.
TOWN ON N4K 1X3
CANADA
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Provinces are written with the 2 letter abbreviations, not the old 3 letter abbreviations
example: AB, MB, BC, NB, NL, QC, SK, ON, YK, NT, NU, NS, PE
NOT: Ont, Que, PEI, etc...
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Return addresses should be formatted in the same way, and be placed at the top left hand corner OR on the back of the envelope at the top.
Happy Mailing!
