DPD Netherlands: Recipients to resume signing for receipt

DPD Netherlands has announced that, as the country’s 1.5-metre social distancing rule has now been lifted, contactless deliveries are “no longer necessary” and so the company is “carefully preparing” to reintroduce the procedure of recipients signing for receipt by 1 March.

In a statement on its website dated yesterday (20 February), DPD said: “We have found that shippers do prefer it if recipients actually sign for receipt, and we are happy to meet the shippers’ wishes.”

DPD accepted that, because of concerns over COVID, some recipients may still be reluctant to get closer than 1.5 metres to the delivery driver in order to sign – and so the company has come up with a solution: “If a recipient makes clear that he doesn’t wish to sign because he wants to keep his distance, the driver will sign on his behalf. That signature together with the GPS coordinates will then serve as the POD. But we expect that most recipients will have no problem in signing.”