US Shipping Delays During Holiday Season

This is a reminder to all our esteemed clients and ecommerce business owners who currently sell to the US market regarding the usual holiday shipping delays that are now a common part of retail business, especially during this time of the year.
We have reached the end of 2021 and the merry and bright Christmas times. And we truly hope these holidays bring massive prosperity to your business and genuine happiness to you and your loved ones.

We bring this reminder to inform you about the reasons and ramifications of the recent shipping delays in delivery in the United States and provide you with recommendations on how to better deal with the recent developments that have affected every part of the cross-border ecommerce supply chain.

Why parcel shipping delays?

Different factors have impacted the ecommerce retail supply chain in the United States recently, posing a number of challenges in shipping from China to the US that we continue to work out measures to mitigate so that both our esteemed clients and we can continue to run our businesses profitably.

First, the new COVID-19 variant, Omicron, has forced flight cancellations, air traffic reductions, and labor cuts both internationally and domestically, causing a slowdown in the logistics supply chain.

Second, this year’s holiday personal online purchases have increased and hit the highest peak in the past 3 years. Resulting in high demand but not enough supply for warehousing, logistics services, and last-mile deliveries.

Third, there is not enough manpower, warehousing space, and trucks to deal with the record demand for the holidays. Most American warehousing, fulfillment, and shipping service providers are now working at their peak capacity. However, having insufficient human and operational resources to handle the high numbers of parcels has led to massive last-mile delivery bottlenecks in the whole country.

Forth, the weather conditions in some areas make last-mile deliveries even harder, forcing some delivery companies to postpone their delivery schedules and causing bottlenecks.

Shipping Schedule for 2022 Holidays

The three largest package domestic carriers released their 2021 holiday shipping deadlines, which are the recommended last days to ship gifts locally:

UPS

The following are the recommended last days for shipping gifts domestically for December 24 delivery. Ground: Check the UPS website for a quote. 3-Day Select: Tuesday, December 21. 2nd Day Air: Wednesday, December 22. Next Day Air: Thursday, December 23.

Note: UPS says its service guarantee is suspended on most packages until further notice, but it is has made some “operational adjustments,” which include extending delivery commitment times for UPS Next Day Air from 10:30 a.m. to noon.

FedEx

The following are the last days to ship gifts within the US FedEx Home Delivery, FedEx Ground: Wednesday, December 15. FedEx Express Saver, FedEx 3Day Freight: Tuesday, December 21. FedEx 2Day: Wednesday, December 22. FedEx 1Day Freight, FedEx Extra Hours: Thursday, December 23. FedEx SameDay: Friday, December 24.

USPS

USPS notes that most shipping deadlines are not a guarantee, and the dates are for estimated delivery before December 25. The recommended “send-by dates for expected delivery” before December 25 in the 48 contiguous states. Retail Ground: Wednesday, December 15. First-Class Mail: Friday, December 17. Priority Mail: Saturday, December 18. Priority Mail Express: Thursday, December 23.

Besides, we have also created an Ecommerce Logistic Holiday Schedule for this year that goes as follows:

Recommended Measures

We recommend you take measures such as;

• Get in touch with your ecommerce fulfillment supplier and ask for specific information about the shipping times during this period.
• Inform your customers about possible delays through POP-OUT banners on your website (especially on the cart check-out page) and emails.
• Make adjustments to your books where necessary.
• Act fast to save time and more and stay prepared for any shipping delays to the situation.

On our part, we will stay on top of these developments and make sure we act with good speed to ensure you always have the advantage to need to beat the competition.

Thank you for your understanding and continued cooperation.

Best Regards,

Dropship China Pro

December 23, 2021