A family in the De Winton area says they went nearly nine months without receiving a single letter, flyer or bill and the repercussions of a Canada Post misstep left their home without power.

Trent MacIsaac and Christine Cottrell moved their family from Calgary to an acreage in January.

“We just moved out here to have an awesome place to raise our family,” said MacIsaac. “ Out of the city, rural schools and kids wait at the end of the driveway for the school bus –type of life.”

The couple says they went through the proper avenues to change their address and provided their new address, along with the postal code Canada Post provided, to everyone they knew.  

All mail destined for the home was bouncing back to the sender for several months, an issue the family was oblivious to until their tax rebate failed to arrive. “That’s when we really took notice because now money is involved,” said MacIsaac. “I was expecting close to $3,000. Checking the mailbox every day started getting old.”

The family’s electricity was cut off for a brief period over unpaid bills, bills they never received. “It’s frustrating especially with four kids and trying to explain to the power companies what happened,” said Cottrell. “It makes us look we’re just being flaky but the fact is we can’t receive mail.”

The house the family purchased near De Winton had been vacant for a significant period of time and the property’s mailing address, and the postal code, did not appear in Canada Post’s system. Once the family complained to Canada Post, a second postal code was provided but the family’s mailbox remained empty.

Christine Cottrell said the lack of mail has been a frustrating ordeal.

“Not being able to receive proof of insurance, my Canada child benefit has been put on hold twice now, stuff from the speech pathologist, stuff from the kids’ school,” listed Cottrell. “We just started a new school this year and we were supposed to get an orientation package this summer and didn’t get it.”

“It hasn’t been fun.”

This week, the family received their first piece of mail but it arrived with a postal code that the sender, MacIsaac’s mother-in-law, found through a search on Google Maps.

MacIsaac says he wants Canada Post to address the issue.

“I want a mailing address and I want Canada Post to recognize, because you can’t fix a mistake until you recognize it, they need to fix it,” said MacIsaac. “Now I want an apology.”

According to Canada Post officials, dueling postal codes were the root of the family’s lack of mail but the issue was compounded by the fact the family’s acreage was situated between Calgary and Okotoks and its Canada Post jurisdiction was unclear.

Canada Post has started monitoring the family’s mail with date stamps to ensure the mail can be tracked and arrives as scheduled.

With files from CTV’s Chris Epp