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.