Swiss Post and online retailers find solutions for parcel delivery bottlenecks
The huge increase in online orders during the coronavirus crisis has led to bottlenecks in parcel delivery at Swiss Post. Retailers and Swiss Post have therefore jointly decided on relief measures.
On behalf of the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (DETEC) and under the leadership of Swiss Post, top representatives from the retail, logistics and social partners agreed on a package of measures at a round table on Tuesday.
According to a press release issued by Swiss Post and the other partners from the mail order and retail sectors on Wednesday, the joint effort will enable people to continue to stay safely at home and receive supplies while at the same time maintaining the supply system in Switzerland for the time being.
Parcel centers as a bottleneck
The bottleneck is the volume of parcels that have to be processed by Swiss Post employees in the parcel centers. Due to the social distancing requirements, the number of employees cannot be increased at will despite the large volumes.
A bundle of measures is intended to provide relief. In future, small parcels will increasingly be processed via the letter mail logistics chain. Several Swiss parcel service providers and logistics companies are making some of their sorting and transport capacities available to Swiss Post.
With the Click&Collect system, it should also be possible to collect goods ordered online from retailers' open points of sale and post offices. The retailers will also take over some of the pre-sorting for Swiss Post, for example by size and destination.
However, depending on the development of parcel volumes and the situation in Switzerland, it is to be expected that further measures will be necessary in the coming weeks, according to the press release.
The staff association transfair stated in a communiqué that further measures should not be taken at the expense of employees. Increased weekly working hours are not an option. The fact that the system can no longer keep up is due to the transport and space capacities of the parcel centers.
Quotas introduced
Last Friday, Swiss Post pulled the ripcord and announced that quotas would be imposed on the 100 largest parcel clients. Otherwise, it would no longer be able to cope with the flood of parcels.
The Swiss Mail Order Association had expressed its alarm. Various online and stationary retailers had meanwhile increased or relocated their capacities in order to cope with the increasing online demand. Now these efforts are being called into question within a day. (SDA)
