For Deborah Yedlin, the federal labour minister’s announcement that he is sending the labour dispute between Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) to the Canada Industrial Relations Board for resolution is “long overdue.”

Yedlin, the president and CEO of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, says because of the impact of the strike on small businesses and not-for-profits, she would like to have seen the federal government intervene much earlier, as it did during the work stoppages involving railway and port workers.

“This is something that’s hurt so many businesses, especially small businesses, and it’s hurt so many not-for-profits and charities. This has been a really, really tough thing for them to negotiate,” said Yedlin.

Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon said Friday that if the Canada Industrial Relations Board determines negotiations between Canada Post and CUPW are at an impasse, it has been directed to order striking workers back to work under the existing collective agreement until May 22, 2025. He says that could happen as soon as early next week.

If it does, it will be a great relief for Heather Morley, the CEO of Inn from the Cold, a Calgary charity that helps vulnerable families find shelter.

She says the strike has caused a “high level of anxiety” at many charities in the city.

Over half of Inn from the Cold’s $11-million annual operating budget comes from donations. They had set a goal of raising $1 million in December, but due to the strike, fundraising is down about 30 per cent.

“Bringing that money in is critical for us to be able to help families that need it most,” Morley told CBC News.

She says a quick resolution to the strike will still leave Inn from the Cold enough time to salvage the campaign.

“If the mail can start moving, that would be a very good thing for us,” she said.

WATCH | MacKinnon says Ottawa ‘calling a timeout’ as he intervenes in postal strike:

Brittany Beatty is the director of community engagement at Discovery House, which provides long-term housing, mental health support and other programs and services in Calgary for children and women recovering from domestic violence.

She says about 25 per cent of her organization’s fundraising happens during the month of December, so the Canada Post work disruption has forced her team to pivot to other ways of reaching out, like text messaging, emails and social media.

She describes the past four weeks as “a stressful time.”

“It will certainly be a relief to receive some of those donations that we know are sitting with Canada Post right now,” Beatty said.

According to the labour minister, 1.65 million pieces of personal correspondence are in secure storage at Canada Post facilities awaiting delivery.

Beatty says she’s hopeful Discovery House will be able to make up the fundraising shortfall when postal service resumes, but she says some of that might not happen before the new year.

Jim Osborne, the owner of the Scottish Shoppe and A Little Bit of Ireland in Kensington, says the increased shipping costs associated with the Canada Post strike have caused a “lot of disruption” to small businesses like his.

He told CBC News he welcomes MacKinnon’s decision but fears it comes too late for retailers in their busiest time of the year.

“Most of us have come through the COVID period, and just as we are getting back to normal with new ideas … we were hit with this,” Osborne said.

He added that he was fortunate his store didn’t see a lot of cancellations, with many customers opting for courier deliveries, despite the higher cost.

WATCH | CUPW president calls federal intervention ‘an attack on all labour’:

The strike has lasted more than four weeks, and according to MacKinnon, the federal mediator said negotiations were going in the wrong direction.

“Canadians are rightly fed up,” the labour minister said.

Yedlin believes one of the reasons Ottawa waited this long before acting is a lack of pushback from Canadians, who probably don’t realize how important Canada Post is to small business.

Part of the blame for that, she says, falls to Canada Post itself.

“I don’t think Canada Post has made the case for itself, in terms of how it supports the underlying flow of goods across the country.… I think Canada Post has a perspective that people understand what service they provide and they don’t have to explain it,” said Yedlin.

“Here’s the issue … it’s not purely a mail service organization any more. It’s a package delivery organization,” she said, one that is “critical to our economic prosperity.”

That means Canada Post no longer has a monopoly on the services it provides, which is why she thinks the biggest loser in all of this might turn out to be Canada Post itself.

“You always lose market share when you do something like this,” she said.