Australia Post has released its ‘deadline’ for packages to be delivered before Christmas in an effort to help retailers and customers avoid disappointment during what it believes will be its busiest-ever festive season.

Parcels will need to be sent no later than Monday 13 December in order to make it to the recipient on time, while sending via Express Post will push the deadline out to December 20.

However, with parcel volumes hitting record levels in 2021, Australia Post having already had to pause parcel collections, twice, while it works through backlogs this year, and December predicted to be busier than last year’s holiday period – customers and retailers are encouraged to send their post “as early as they can”.

Australia Post executive general manager, business and government Gary Starr said the business’ preparations for the holiday period are well underway and that an additional 4000 casual team members have already been recruited.

“We’ve planned ahead with extra air freight capacity, weekend deliveries, and recruitment of thousands of new team members to ramp up our delivery services, parcel sorting and customer car, and we’ll be delivering right up until Christmas Eve,” Starr said.

“We encourage people to make a note of these important delivery dates, because although we’ll deliver items sent after these dates as quickly as we can, they may not arrive until after Christmas.”