ShipMatrix data highlights 2024 Peak Season parcel delivery difficulties

Earlier this week, data issued by ShipMatrix, a subsidiary of Pittsburgh-based SJ Consulting, highlighted delivery challenges in the 2024 Peak Season.

The firm defines the peak period as the dates between December 1-December 31.

In its data on millions of parcels shipped during this period in 2024, ShipMatrix found that the on-time performance (OTP) for the three national carriers—FedEx, UPS, and the United States Postal Service (USPS)—which the firm said is based on specific commit times for their respective parcel services, express, deferred, ground, and last mile, came in at 91.8% for FedEx, 96.5% for UPS, and 90.4 for USPS. These readings represented across the board annual declines, with 2023 OTP data for FedEx, UPS, and USPS, at 98.3%, 98.7%, and 96.5%, respectively.

“The larger drop in OTP for the Postal Service in 2024 compared to the prior year may be due to USPS implementing Delivering for America plan,” said ShipMatrix. “Furthermore, if Parcel Select parcels are excluded (since it is just the last mile of the total journey), Postal Service’s OTP for Ground Advantage and Priority Mail parcels drops to 84.7 percent. In addition, even with a shorter peak period in 2024, the parcel industry delivered over 2.2 billion parcels. However, the more noteworthy development was that Amazon, as a shipper delivered over 25 million parcels per day of its own and FBA online orders, exceeding the volume delivered by FedEx, UPS and even USPS if its last mile deliveries are excluded.”

These OTP numbers were below the firm’s data for Cyber Week, which ShipMatrix defines as the week of December 1-7‑and a period in which more than 100 million parcels per day are handled, with more than 80% of these parcels being holiday gifts and delivered to residences.

Combined on-time performance (OTP) for all domestic parcel services for the three carriers using end-of-day delivery, for express and an extra day, hit high levels, respectively, with FedEx at 98.7%, UPS at 98.9%, and the USPS at 98.7%, reported ShipMatrix. The firm noted that with more than 100 million parcels shipped per day, even a 99% OTP results in 1 million parcels being delayed, with anecdotal reports of late deliveries not implying carriers are facing delivery challenges.  

In a previous interview with LM, ShipMatrix President Satish Jindel said that efforts by carriers in running on-time performance and doing it correctly is five times more of a larger task than it was even two or three years ago—and almost double what it was last year—due to there being a whole host of complex rules for what the commit and transit time is by things like lanes, distance, and days in transit, for FedEx, UPS, and the USPS.

“Express services are measured for delivery by the end of the day,” he said. “So, if we had Express package coming to your home and the commit time may have been 3 P.M.,” he said. “If it got delivered at 3:30 P.M., I considered it as on time, because you may not know it was committed for 3 P.M. if you pick it up at the end of the day. It is the same thing for ground. You are ordering these things for Christmas; whether you get it on December 5 or December 6, does it make a difference? No, of course not and carriers can add one extra day to the regular commit time to provide that because otherwise it becomes relevant that I do that. Most people wouldn't otherwise think of it. As I get into the final week of December, I will not be worrying adding that extra day, because then every day becomes critical, whether you get it on the 22^nd, 23^rd, or 24^th, now you'll start getting nervous. So, I will make sure I'm recognizing the relevance of this information.”

With providers outside of FedEx, UPS, and the USPS increasing their carrying capacity, Jindel said it negatively impacts these legacy carriers.

As an example, he cited Walmart and the more it does online ordering fulfillment from one of its local stores for same-day or next-day delivery, for goods ordered through Walmart, it hurts a larger legacy carrier like FedEx, as the orders are being delivered by a carrier like Doordash or Uber Eats.

“[Legacy carriers] lose that volume and that revenue, and they now have a competitor that is a shipper, just like how Amazon has become a competitor,” he said. And he added there are likely to be increased delivery presences and also future competition from retailers like Costco and Walmart.