Christmas is only a few weeks away, so if you don't want to rely on Father Christmas alone, the best way to get your presents delivered is via a parcel service. DPD Germany is again expecting huge parcel volumes in 2021. To ensure that presents arrive under the Christmas tree safely and on time, there are a few things to bear in mind when it comes to packaging and shipping. DPD explains to you what is important and gives you lots of useful tips for the successful shipping of gifts.

It all comes down to the right packaging!

The parcel service's delivery personnel always handle your shipments with the greatest of care. In spite of this you should make sure that the packaging is sturdy. The cardboard must be able to support the weight of the parcel's contents, even in the case of impacts. Any empty spaces should be padded out so that the contents of the box have as little room to move as possible. Heavy items should always be placed at the bottom of the parcel. If the cardboard box has already been used, any old barcodes and parcel labels must be removed or taped over so that they are hidden. The delivery address should always appear on the largest surface of the parcel and should be as legible as possible (preferably a label printed on the PC or by hand in capital letters) and complete. You should also not forget the name and address of the shipper. Undeliverable items can only be returned to you if your address is on the parcel.

How to wrap gifts not only attractively but also sustainably

As beautiful as ribbons and wrapping paper around the parcel look: it's better to do without such outside decoration so that your parcel doesn't get caught in the automatic sorting machines. This could block the machines. Your creative packaging skills should therefore focus on the actual gift inside the parcel. To avoid unnecessary waste, you should think about sustainable packaging. Instead of costly, energy-intensive gift wrapping, you could use plain wrapping paper, pretty pages from magazines, cloths, empty jars or scraps of fabric for internal wrapping. Old (shoe) boxes and cartons also make excellent gift wrapping when nicely glued and decorated. By the way, you can ship your Christmas parcels in a particularly sustainable way with DPD: DPD measures the exact CO2 footprint of every parcel and offsets unavoidable emissions by financing clean energy projects around the world. The result is 100 per cent climate-neutral parcel delivery at no additional cost to you.

These are the deadlines for your 2021 Christmas shipping

To ensure that gifts reach the consignee on time for Christmas Eve, DPD recommends that standard parcels should be dropped off at a Pickup parcelshop by Tuesday 21 December (ideally by 12 noon). Priority and express parcels will still arrive on time if they are posted as late as Thursday, 23 December (12 noon). For delivery to other EU countries DPD recommends that standard parcels should be sent by Friday, 17 December (12 noon). Shipping parcels with DPD is very simple: with the Parcel Shop Finder at www.dpd.de you can easily find the nearest of over 7,000 Pickup parcelshops. All shipping preparations can be conveniently carried out digitally on the website and in the DPD app, including payment. DPD also offers a practical girth and volumetric weight calculator for calculating the combined circumference + longest side and the volumetric weight.

Keeping a constant eye on the gifts you have sent

Once you have posted your Christmas parcel, DPD offers you the option of tracking the progress of your gift in real time and at any time. Extensive tools are available to you for this purpose both on the DPD website and in the DPD app. For example, you can track the current shipping status via Live Tracking and see where your parcel is at the moment on a detailed map display. Thanks to the Predict digital service, for each parcel you also receive a delivery forecast which is accurate to within one hour. In the course of the day the predicted delivery time is even narrowed down to 30 minutes. If you enter the consignee's email address when you send the parcel, he or she can also conveniently manage the place and day of delivery if he or she will not be at home. Each shipment can be redirected individually, for example to a Pickup parcelshop. By the way: consignees who would like to thank their delivery driver during this particularly busy pre-Christmas period can this year do so conveniently and contactlessly via the DPD app. A digital tip can be given there, which is paid via PayPal.