Overnight Delivery Services Battle Down to the Last Possible Minute

With Hanukkah starting today and Christmas drawing near, exhausted employees of overnight delivery services are feeling the pinch as they scurry to fill a flood of mailings from frantic customers who want assurance that their packages will arrive on time.

“You know, you can never rest until you know it’s there,” said Sandra Munoz, a spokeswoman for Federal Express.

Munoz said the sudden surge of overnight delivery traffic this week, especially Wednesday and Thursday, came from holiday enthusiasts who have been busy shopping and have forgotten about sending.

“It’s like, ‘Uh-oh. I’m in trouble. If I don’t get this package someplace, my family’s not going to speak to me,’ ” she said. “It happens.”

For some overnight carriers, such as United Parcel Service, Thursday at 5:30 p.m. signaled the deadline for those customers who wanted parcels to arrive for weekend festivities.

“Other than an extreme circumstance--an act of God--we do guarantee next-day delivery,” said Lisa Brogden, a UPS customer service supervisor. She said that, aside from natural disasters, all packages promised by Christmas will arrive at their destinations today.

Delivery companies such as Federal Express, however, will be open today, promising that packages sent today will arrive by Saturday.

But, naturally, that assurance comes with an extra price tag.

Federal Express operators said that goods delivered on Saturday via overnight service generally require an additional $10 charge, and the Saturday before Christmas Eve is no different. For example, sending a 10-pound package to Pittsburg with the promise that it will arrive on Saturday would total about $45, plus the $10 extra charge.

The prices for overnight delivery seem to have little effect on the delivery services’ customers, however, judging from the number of packages being sent this past week.

UPS, which has an average daily delivery nationwide of 11.4 million packages, has registered an increase of about 70% since the beginning of December--to an average of 20 million deliveries per day.

“Our peak is right now, this week,” Brogden said.

Locally, that means an estimated 20,000 customers sent about 60,000 packages during the three-week period that the Anaheim office has been temporarily housed under a tent in the parking lot of Anaheim Stadium, she explained.

“It’s been very, very crazy,” said Brogden, whose staff of telephone operators in Anaheim serviced about 20,000 calls a day this week.

“It doesn’t really quiet down until the first of the year,” she added.

For those who miss the Friday deadline, the U.S. Postal Service still offers Express Mail as a last-ditch effort to get the package across the country in time.

Even on Christmas Eve, an Express Mail envelope dropped into an Express Mail box will be delivered the next day. But, postal employees say, there is a catch.

Express Mail customers still need to pick up an Express Mail envelope from a post office ahead of time, said Peggy Bellot, a 10-year postal veteran. Since most offices will be closed from this afternoon until Tuesday morning, customers need to scout out the few offices that are open Saturday from 9 a.m to noon, such as the Anaheim main office or the office in Huntington Center, or buy the envelope today.

Bellot, like most overnight delivery service employees, has been putting in lots of extra hours to handle the holiday packages. But she said the hectic pace doesn’t bother her much, because she expects it this time of the year.

“When the loads (of Express Mail arrive), the supervisor hollers on the intercom” for extra help, she said. “We drop everything for it,” she noted, adding proudly, “because it’s guaranteed.”