If you are a courier driver, you may be interested to hear about some of the results of part of a YouGov survey that was carried out between the 5th to 6th May 2020 with 1,667 adults here in Great Britain. The full survey can be found on the YouGov website but we thought it worth highlighting the area about parcel deliveries.

Apparently, 53% of participants in the survey said that he or she had ordered a parcel that contained non-essential items to be delivered to their home during the Coronavirus pandemic. The survey found that 46% of people taking part in the survey ordered parcels with essential items inside.

We are sure that courier drivers will agree that is a very high percentage of people who ordered non-essential items online that were subsequently delivered by courier firms. Surely that has meant that has placed courier drivers at greater risk of getting COVID-19 as well as putting customers at an increased risk of getting the virus. The question has to be asked: “Could the customer not have delayed ordering a non-essential item until it is considered safe to do so?”

Another interesting piece of data in the survey is that 59% of people ordering non-essential items believe someone delivering such parcels has a minimum of a 50/50 chance of getting the Coronavirus. This is rather concerning as one would have thought if people felt there was such a high possibility of a courier driver getting the virus in the above situation that he or she would delay ordering such items until the pandemic is at an end and it is safe to order such things online.

As a courier driver, you will no doubt have introduced certain safety measures to hopefully prevent or reduce the possibility of either you or your customers catching the Coronavirus. This would no doubt include social distancing when delivering parcels i.e. you may decide to ring the customer when you are outside their property to say that you have left the parcel on their doorstep or you may have left the parcel in a safe place at your customer’s property.

Let us hope that we see an end to the pandemic as soon as possible so that things can return to normal enabling courier drivers to go about their day-to-day work without having to worry about catching the Coronavirus.