E-tailers, logistics company may hire 1.5 lakh for festive sales – Times of India

BENGALURU: With consumer demand expected to surge for e-commerce in the festive sales, top e-tailers and logistics platforms are cumulatively expected to create over 1.5 lakh such seasonal jobs in supply chain and delivery, including the hirings that started few months ago.
Amazon India is set to hire another 15,000-20,000 additional seasonal workers for delivery and supply chain roles, two people aware of the matter said. This is on top of the 50,000 roles it had announced in May, which according to the company, has been filled to meet post-lockdown demand for goods online.

Logistics firm ECom Express has said it is hiring 30,000 for the festive season expecting about 9,000 of them to be made permanent at the end of the year while Flipkart had announced 70,000 similar roles as well. Other online platforms and delivery firms are also firming plans to meet the festive season order volumes, expected to hit a peak of 7.5-8 million daily shipments.

The additional hiring is underway and companies are willing to offer incentives to have adequate number of delivery and supply-chain executives sign up with them before the flagship sales, expected near the second half of October, said senior executives at blue-collar-focused staffing agencies and logistics consultants. These are temporary roles to meet additional demand during festive season and only a part of these roles are made into permanent ones, based on demand. Owing to Covid-19, e-commerce sales have surpassed pre-Covid-19 sales already and the trend holds steady giving optimism to e-tailers and industry stakeholders.
“We have noticed besides healthcare and pharma, intent to hire in e-commerce is encouraging overall though not comparable to pre-Covid-19 hirings. Hiring intent in e-commerce and logistics is measured and in response to demand, which is expected to be higher during festive season sales due to Covid-19 induced push for online shopping. Hyperlocal delivery apps are also witnessing increase in demand leading to increased demand of the delivery agents in specific cities and towns,” said Rituparna Chakraborty, co-founder and EVP, Teamlease, one of the leading staffing firms.

These temporary roles on average pay about Rs 20,000-25,000 per month. The seasonal roles are typically anywhere between a minimum of three months to about a year.
“We have increased our delivery network and added close to 200 new delivery stations, ahead of festive season. This includes both Amazon operated and partner operated stations. Apart from enabling reach into remote towns and villages, it’s also going to ensure customers in those areas get much faster delivery,” said Prakash Rochlani, director, last mile operations, Amazon India.
It has around 1,700 such delivery centres across the country. He said the company was adding new associates without specifying numbers. “We will continue to create thousands of additional opportunities across the network to support customer demand across the country this upcoming festive season, so customers can stay and stay safe,” a spokesperson of Amazon India added.

The e-tailer last year had about 1 lakh associates across delivery and supply chain roles. The hiring plans announced in May were to create new positions as well as fill vacant positions created by pandemic-led migration. With the additional hiring plans, Amazon India logistics and supply chain could end up with 1.3-1.5 lakh associates. Amazon rival Flipkart also has around 1 lakh associates for delivery and supply chain roles.
“For some third-party logistics firms, order volumes are 40% higher during this time. So, they typically bulk up team size equally to service the extra orders,” a senior logistics consultant said.