On top of brightening the winter for so many NOTLers with her family's appearance on “Family Feud Canada,” Katherine Gaio was nominated as a Pandemic Hero for her constant willingness to go out of the way to make sure people get their mail. And a shout out to all mail carriers for their work on the front lines of the pandemic.
Gaio, a longtime employee of Canada Post, was nominated anonymously by a fan who sang her praises.
“She works tirelessly for Canada Post, making sure that everyone gets their packages and parcels as quickly and easily as possible. There are so many little things that she does to go above and beyond her basic job responsibilities because she knows how much it means to people to get the things they’ve ordered on time and easily.”
Sometimes when she attempts a delivery the person doesn’t answer the door. It would be much more convenient to bring the package back to the post office for the recipient to retrieve — and many mail carriers do this because that is all that is expected of them.
“However, Katherine recognizes how inconvenient this might be for the person, so as a way of going above and beyond she will circle back around to the person’s house once she’s completed the rest of the deliveries in the neighbourhood to see if the person is now home and able to sign for the package.”
“Many times the person had been simply out walking the dog and just missed the attempt, so they were now able to receive it, without even realizing that they had just about missed it.”
That is just one of the “small sacrifices” that people wouldn’t even realize have been made. “I think it’s easy to overlook our mail carriers but they have been out on the front line this entire pandemic. With such a huge increase in online ordering, their work has been more important than ever.”