GLS Belgium splits up parcel and pallet activities

GLS Belgium has completed the reorganisation of its nine locations in the country splitting up the parcel and pallet activities into two separate businesses to streamline its operations and modernise its freight handling.

In January this year, the company implemented the new processes at the two remaining sites in Brussels and Vilvoorde at the same time. GLS Belgium has thus restructured its complete network within about one year following the integration of GLS Belgium Distribution (formerly ABX Belgium Distribution) into its network.

Under the new structure, the depot in Vilvoorde will from now on focus on freight sorting only while Brussels will be in charge of all parcel operations within the company. This new specialisation clearly simplifies the working processes at the sites. GLS continues to divide the respective delivery areas to centralise the volumes in a more convenient way and to make a better use of the tours. GLS freight will be transported via direct routes in future.

“About two years after the acquisition of the new Belgian subsidiaries, we have harmonised the activities of GLS Belgium and GLS Belgium Distribution nationwide,” said Eberhard Fritze, Managing Director, GLS Europe West. “Our service range today includes the high quality handling of parcel, freight and express – everything from one source.”

GLS Belgium said in a statement that it has invested a total of €3.5m into the restructuring of all the nine locations excluding investment in the company’s IT operations. With the acquisition of ABX Belgium Distribution in December 2006, GLS Belgium has become the leading player on the Belgian B2B market with a market share of 35%.

The route of each parcel and each pallet is recorded on its way through the sorting system. In addition, the shipments are scanned by GLS staff at the interfaces. Customers can retrieve this information over the internet via the Track & Trace service which is an added value to security and transparency, GLS said.

Moreover, all GLS sites have been equipped with conveyor belt systems as well as scanner and video control technology as part of the industrialisation of the parcel sorting according to the European standards.

“Thanks to the strong commitment of all participants, the introduction of the new processes worked out very well”, Fritze added. “We even slightly preceded the schedule finalising the project three months earlier than expected.”