Major domestic parcel carriers are achieving high on-time performance levels even as volumes surge during the holiday peak shipping season, according to an analysis of customer shipments released by ShipMatrix on Monday.
Ninety-eight percent of express, next-day and ground shipments delivered by FedEx (NYSE: FDX), UPS (NYSE: UPS) and the U.S. Postal Service were on time within one day of the promised day of delivery between Dec. 1 and Dec. 6 as the industry absorbed a 30% increase in volume compared to the rest of the year.
ShipMatrix’s methodology excludes delays caused by weather, shippers, consignees, road closures and other factors not in the carriers’ control. It also allows for an extra day to be considered on time because it assumes consumers aren’t interested in day specific delivery this time of year as long as they get the package before Christmas.
The parcel volumes validate that consumers are still buying despite economic uncertainty. Adobe Analytics predicted that a record $253.4 billion will be spent online in the final two months, up 5.3% from 2024. Online shopping data covering the five-day shopping period from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday, shows consumers spent $44.2 billion online, up 7.7% year over year.
ShipMatrix, which helps businesses manage their parcel and less-than-truckload spending, in September forecast parcel volumes would increase 5% year over year to 2.3 billion pieces. FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service raised peak-season surcharges despite peak volumes being essentially flat year over year since 2021 and having plenty of capacity.
The Pittsburgh-based consulting firm said that UPS’s on-time performance was 98.9%, followed by FedEx at 98.3% and the Postal Service at 97.2%. Compared to the same week of 2024, UPS had the same result, while FedEx and the Postal Service dipped slightly from 98.7% and 97.4% on-time delivery levels.
The three carriers, Amazon, Walmart, other private fleets, and smaller independent couriers collectively handled more than 568 million parcels during Cyber Week, up 30% from the pre-peak period. The total volume for the same first week of December in 2024 was about 532 million parcels.
Shipping volumes are expected to remain heavy in the days leading to Christmas. Bad weather could influence some shoppers to order online rather than visit physical stores. Customers likely will have to pay for premium shipping for orders placed after Dec. 17 and there is no guarantee at that point that all of them will make it on time, especially if bad weather slows air and ground transportation.
According to the Postal Service’s real-time Holiday Mail Counter, more than 7 billion pieces of mail have so far been accepted since Nov. 24. The figure doesn’t break out the amount in parcels and letters. In 2024, the USPS processed 11.5 billion total packages and mail pieces during the holiday season, and on average it took 2.8 days to deliver them.
High on-time performance doesn’t mean parcel carriers are perfect. In Louisville, Kentucky, for example, there have been complaints of undelivered packages, according to local TV station WAVE. The USPS attributed delays at the Louisville distribution center to severe weather in the region, combined with higher-than-normal volumes.
Winter weather in the Northern Plains, Great Lakes, Ohio Valley, and Northeastern U.S. and flooding in Washington is impacting delivery, according to service alerts posted on the Postal Service’s website.
ShipMatrix notes that with more than 100 million parcels shipped per day, even 99% on-time performance results in 1 million pieces being delayed. Anecdotal reports of late deliveries don’t imply that carriers are facing delivery challenges.
(Clarification: An earlier version of this story defined on-time performance as meeting the promised delivery day. ShipMatrix defines on-time during the holidays as expected delivery day, plus one.)
Click here for more FreightWaves stories by Eric Kulisch.
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