MADISON, Wis. — It’s the most wonderful time of the year, but also the busiest for the United States Postal Service and The UPS Store.
With millions of packages being shipped nationwide, Keith Johnston, who owns The UPS Store on University Avenue, said the volume of packages they’re dealing with this year is up about 25%.
“We are getting things out the same day we get them,” Johnston said. We are packing them, shipping them, taking care of them on the same day.”
Johnston said his team is working longer hours to make sure packages are delivered on time. Employees with USPS are also working longer hours, according to USPS Communications Specialist Bob Sheehan.
“Because of the volumes we are seeing this time of the year, we do have our employees working longer hours.”
According to a USPS press release, “A historic record of holiday volume compounded by a temporary employee shortage due to the COVID-19 surge, and capacity challenges with airlifts and trucking for moving this historic volume of mail are leading to temporary delays.”
“We’ve had elevated volumes throughout the year because of the pandemic and that just followed into our holiday season,” Sheehan said.
Johnston said The UPS Store he owns processes around 600 packages a day. So far to his knowledge, the packages are getting to their destinations on time.
Dylan Lund has worked at The UPS Store for four years and said this year, “We have a lot more packages than ever before, no doubt.”
Lund said the store closes at 6:30 p.m., but he and several other employees stay until 8:30 p.m. some nights making sure everything is ready to go and can be shipped out on time.
“Each individual person is moving about 150-200 a day. So there’s three or four of us in the store. So we are probably moving 500-600 packages through the store each day,” Lund said. “It keeps us moving. Keeps us active. It’s good work. I keep saying I don’t have to go to the gym every day now.”
Sheehan and Johnston recommend sending your packages out as soon as possible, with Christmas being just nine days away. The deadline to get packages delivered in time for Christmas through ground delivery for both UPS and USPS was Tuesday, Dec. 15.
Upcoming deadlines for USPS are as follows:
Dec. 15– USPS Retail Ground Service
Dec. 18 — First-Class Mail service
Dec. 19 — Priority Mail Service
Dec. 23 — Priority Mail Express service
UPS also offers 3-day, 2-day and next day delivery. They suggest requiring a signature for deliveries due to the increase in porch pirates this time of year.
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