Getting Brexit-ready: the lessons we learned at DPD.
For the last 48 years, it has been as easy to ship a parcel from Birmingham to Berlin as from Birmingham to Bolton. Not any more. This all changed six weeks ago, following the UK’s withdrawal from the EU Single Market and Customs Union. At DPD we started getting ready for Brexit in June 2016. Still, nothing could have prepared us for the reality of our first day trying to send vehicles across The Channel into mainland Europe. As we, and our customers, grappled with new rules and new IT platforms to tackle customs clearance, it meant that 20% of parcels had incorrect or incomplete data and had to be held in our network (a figure that has now dropped to 5%). Next, delays and congestion hit us at UK ports. Within days, the backlog in our system meant we had to pause our road services to the EU and Ireland for the first time in living memory. Not a decision we took lightly, given that we are part of DPD Group’s massive European road network connecting 900 sites across 30 countries.
Brexit – a bigger mountain to climb than Covid
In fact, if you’d asked me last June whether anything could be as challenging as adapting to Covid-19, I’d have said “No”. I was wrong. Getting Brexit-ready has been by far the most challenging thing we’ve ever done to keep our £300m international business on the road. So far, we’ve invested nearly £14m in the last two years getting ready. That includes recruiting almost 300 additional people – mainly to handle customs clearance – plus massive spend on warehousing space and IT systems. There has also been a knock-on effect across numerous departments, from Sales to Customer Care to Finance and beyond. To make sure we make joined-up decisions, we have a project team of 20 people who meet every morning and afternoon to discuss issues, pool ideas and create solutions for our customers.
As I have discussed previously, when massive change hits your business, you find out what your people are made of. Team DPD is now 22,000 strong (9,000 more than this time last year), and in 2020 I lost count of how many times I asked all of them to “dig deep and go again”. I feel humbled by the incredible resilience our people have shown when faced with the double-whammy of Covid and Brexit. They have shown enormous grit and determination to keep going on a path where there are no shortcuts.
Do you speak Brexit?
It’s also been fascinating to see how different customers have reacted to the new trading environment, and we’ve identified three distinct groups:
1 - Customers who started making thorough preparations months ago and were ready for the extra bureaucracy now required. And as a result, they have barely missed a beat.
2 - A group of customers who decided to ‘wait and see’ before making significant changes.
3 - A segment which put Brexit in the ‘too hard pile’ and/or decided that the cost of being Brexit-ready outweighed the potential benefits.
Re Option 3, of course, it may have been tempting to hide under a rock in the face of seismic changes and hope that you’ll never need an EORI (Economic Operator Registration and Identification) number, that signing up to the GVMS (Goods Vehicle Movement Service) is not a thing and that the words Movement Reference Number (MRN) will never pass your lips. You might also have been tempted to ignore the NCTS (Newly Computerised Transit System). It’s fair to say that Brexit has brought with it a whole blizzard of new acronyms!
In short, getting Brexit-ready has been like learning a whole new language. While we will all be more fluent a year from now, the odd stutter, miscommunication and faux pas at this stage are to be expected.
The DPD approach to Brexit is similar to the mindset we adopted to tackle Covid: focus on what’s most important and on what we can change and accept what’s outside our control. And that would be my advice to companies in options 2 and 3 above. If you’re still in the ‘wait and see’ group, now is the time to get back on the horse.
If you still feel reluctant, remember that, as a wise leader once said, ‘you don’t have to enjoy everything you want to do’. And DPD is here to give you a leg-up. We have the systems in place, and they are working well with the NCTS. Our IT is a bit like an airline’s ‘speedy boarding’. If you give us complete and accurate information, the correct label comes out. Your parcel will arrive at its destination on time.
DPD UK is still aiming to have a 500 million pounds international business by 2025. From 1973 to 2020 trading with our European cousins was a breeze. But, as we discover in times of adversity, only the headwinds make you stronger, so I remain confident that by continuing to work closely with our cherished customers, we can achieve this target.
