NZ Post encourages people to “give Santa a helping hand” and send early for Christmas

NZ Post is getting ready for Christmas, and is asking people to give Santa a helping hand by taking note of the cut-offs for sending dates in New Zealand and around the world.

NZ Post Chief Operating Officer Brendon Main, says Kiwis can help to make sure their Christmas presents are safely under the tree in time for Christmas by getting organised and sending and ordering Christmas presents early.

“It’s been an unpredictable year, so we want to make sure Kiwis are ready for Christmas in plenty of time.

“Due to the COVID-19 worldwide pandemic we have brought forward the deadlines for sending parcels overseas by one week. But we are mindful of how quickly things can change, so we will be keeping our website nzpost.co.nz up to date if there are any changes to these dates between now and Christmas.

“We’d encourage Kiwis to send items as early as they can, both within New Zealand, and internationally, to ensure they are there in plenty of time for Christmas. We also encourage people looking to order items from overseas online stores to do this as early as they can.”

Christmas is usually NZ Post’s busiest time of the year, but due to the COVID-19 Lockdowns, this year has already broken parcel delivery records. “Online shopping remains about 30% up on this time last year, but if COVID-19 has taught us anything it’s the unpredictable nature of the pandemic – so while we are planning for a big Christmas season, it is difficult to know for sure what the next few months are going to bring for online shopping in New Zealand.

“When the Alert Level 4 Lockdown lifted and restrictions of what Kiwis could buy online opened up earlier this year we received about 3.5 million parcels in just two weeks, around 200 parcels a minute, volumes we were not preparing for until many years in the future.

“We’ve learnt a lot from that and we have made changes to how we do things to be ready this Christmas to get those presents under the tree. We’ve planned for a range of different scenarios and are bringing on three additional sites to manage surges in volumes, 200 more courier vans, 185 extra flights, 350 additional processing people and more than 1500 extra transport runs to deliver Christmas presents for New Zealanders.

“We’re very proud of our people – they’ve done an amazing job in this unprecedented year and are gearing up to deliver for New Zealanders again this Christmas,” says Brendon Main.