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Bonn / Hanover (dpa / lni) - The tougher Corona restrictions are fueling online orders and plunging retailers into financial difficulties - but whether the new shutdown could bring parcel services in Lower Saxony to their limits is not yet foreseeable.
"We are indeed very concerned with this question," said Tobias Meyer, board member for the German post and parcel business at Deutsche Post DHL, on Monday.
Much will depend on whether many more gifts will be added to the gifts that have been ordered and sent early when the shops have to close on Wednesday.
At the moment it is therefore "not clear whether a short-term lockdown will require significantly more volume," said Meyer.
However, the group is preparing for it and will “provide every available and mobilizable capacity”.
So far, DHL has already calculated a volume that was at least 15 percent above the previous year.
"In the last week alone we sorted and delivered 56 million parcels - significantly more than ever before in our company's history."
According to Meyer's assessment, shortly before Christmas it will now also be decisive whether established retailers with supplementary internet sales and the manufacturers of the goods can provide and pack the expected additional quantities at all.
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From the point of view of the German Trade Association (HDE), the expanded corona financial aid is too low.
"The funds that have been earmarked so far are nowhere near enough to prevent a wave of bankruptcies in the city centers," criticized the industry representatives.
The same state support is needed that the catering trade, which has been closed since the beginning of November, has received.
The English word lockdown means curfew, shutdown is understood to mean the closure or shutdown of businesses or shops.
In the Corona crisis, both terms are often used in the German language for serious restrictions on social or economic life.