ShipMatrix data highlights solid holiday on-time performance ranges for major parcel carriers

Data issued this week by ShipMatrix, a subsidiary of Pittsburgh-based SJ Consulting, showed strong on-time performance (OTP) ranges, for FedEx, UPS, and the United States Postal Service (USPS), based on their specific commit times for all their respective parcel services combined between Black Friday and Christmas Eve.

The OTP ranges for FedEx, UPS, and USPS, came in at 95.2%, 97.5%, and 94.3%, respectively. ShipMatrix explained that these readings matched up well with the 2019 OTP peak period (prior to the pandemic), with FedEx at 94.6%, UPS at 97.5%, and USPS at 95.6%.

The firm explained that with the Arctic cold blast over the days leading up to Christmas led to the delay of more than 10 million packages. Those delays are not included in these figures as per industry practice of excluding delays that are out of control of the carriers similar to those due to wrong address or businesses being closed,” the firm said.

What’s more, ShipMatrix said that over the 2022 peak period—as well as during pandemic-influenced years in 2020 and 2021—more than 3 billion parcels, or 20 parcels per household, were delivered by the parcel sector.

As previously reported, ShipMatrix identified other holiday season-related delivery takeaways, for retailers and consumers, including:

• orders shipped on Thursdays have 98% OTP, orders shipped on Mondays, at 92%; and
• parcels shipped across the country have a lower OTP by around 4% when compared to parcels moving over a shorter distance, adding that retailers are able to leverage OTP attributes in managing order fulfillment and consumer expectations

In looking back at the lack of needed parcel capacity over the course of the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, ShipMatrix observed that it led to the entrance of new market competitors, including Pitney Bowes, Quiet Platform, and OSM Worldwide, whom, the firm said, may have pushed the national carriers towards hitting higher ODP rates. And ShipMatrix said that comes with the caveat the USPS handles last-mile delivery for those three companies.

ShipMatrix President Satish Jindel previously noted that OTP represents the best benchmark to gauge the ability of the major parcel carriers to handle huge holiday season volume spikes, while also pointing out a major difference between this year when compared to 2020 and 2021.

“This year, with capacity in excess of demand, the industry collectively has reached the pre-pandemic levels,” he said.

The return to pre-pandemic levels is notable, especially when taking into account how a year ago, at this time, the general consensus was the consumers needed to have online orders placed with retailers by December 15 unless the retailer was shipping the items via faster express services, according to ShipMatrix.

And as carriers dealt with labor shortages, which hindered the ability for parcel carriers to bring more people on board, solid OTP levels reflected how carriers have maintained strong service levels related to capacity expansions going back to the 2020 peak, as there has since been an uptick in consumers making purchases at retail stores, coupled with an increase in goods being ordered online earlier, themes which subsequently carried over into 2022.

ShipMatrix has also noted that as more than 70% of parcels are comprised of holiday gifts and delivered to residences, the most notable way to evaluate carriers’ performance is to consider express service as on time of delivered by end of day and Ground within one extra day.