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Delivery companies have taken extra steps to ensure timely delivery.
Delivery companies are warning shoppers to send holiday gifts and make online purchases within the next 10 days as a record number of packages are expected to be delivered.
The U.S. Postal Service, UPS Inc. and FedEx Corp. have taken extra steps to ensure timely delivery of billions of packages this holiday season, including adding staff, infrastructure and pop-up locations.
“This is our season. We’ve been doing it for more than 240 years, so we’re prepared. We prepare all year long,” said Karen Oberkrom, Dayton-area customer relation coordinator with USPS.
The Postal Service expects to deliver more than 16 billion pieces of mail during the holidays, including 900 million packages. To handle the influx, it has expanded retail hours, added 8,000 new vehicles to its fleet, expanded operational capacity with new equipment, hired seasonal staff and enhanced package processing systems to handle 25,000 packages per hour.
Retailers and delivery companies have done a decent job of preparing for a major peak in package delivery this year, said Wright State University supply chain and logistics professor James Hamister. The increase in package carrying started around Thanksgiving, but delivery companies will continue to be in their peak season until the beginning of next year.
“I would always try to do it as early as you can make your decision because you improve your odds no matter what. … There’s a very consolidated, very high level of demand at a time when weather can be pretty challenging,” he said. Read more
Source: TRANSPORT TOPICS
