Alan Brown, CEO of Inital Rentokill, owners of Citylink, says that the parcel industry is fearfull of a huge surge in parcel deliveries in the last two weeks before Christmas.

He states that there is a distinct decision by many consumers to delay their Christmas spending, and that as we approach the end of November the normal Christmas increase has yet to start filtering through.  Although this is consistent with the current economic climate, and not any different from what they expected given the current situation, he was still fearfull that a late surge of spending by consumers could put huge pressure on the parcel companies, which may be a challenge to manage.

Does this mean Extra Work for Couriers at Christmas? 

Many of the Parcel Carriers have spent the past few years cutting back on the number of staff and vehicles that they own and employ directly, therefore a huge surge in parcel volume over a very tight timeframe, with a very specific cut off date will be a huge logistical problem, and it is possible that the parcel carrying networks themselves may not have sufficient in house resources to cope.  Citylink have 10% less vehicles and 1000 less staff than a year ago.  DHL have stopped using many of their own vans & drivers, and are instead contracting out to large local companies. 

We would suggest then that it may be a good time to phone your local depots and update your details if you do subcontract work, or maybe want to do subcontract work for the the major parcel networks. It may well be a case of all hands on decks, so if this is your kind of work make sure that you are on they're list to call.