A woman looks at Chinese Lunar New Year decorations. (Photo : Reuters)
To ensure efficient express delivery during Spring Festival celebrations, Suning Tesco, a Chinese e-commerce supplier, is hiring foreign students to work as couriers, according to China Daily.
Online shopping websites are expecting to be left short-handed with the exodus of workers during the upcoming Chinese Lunar New Year festivities. In order to stand out among the fierce competition, Suning Tesco looked for foreign part-time workers to hire with the goal of keeping the business running normally during this time, at least in major cities.
To meet the demands of the job, Suning Tesco has recruited a group of foreign students to take on the job of couriers in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Nanjing and Chengdu.
Taking on the job comes with the challenge of understanding the Chinese customers of the website.
"All candidates need to receive training on basic greetings in Chinese and gestures, before they actually take on the job," said a worker from the delivery department of the online shopping website.
Ivan, a foreign exchange student from Russia in Guangzhou University, is one of several foreign couriers that Suning Tesco has employed to handle the job.
"I never celebrated Spring Festival in China, very happy to have the chance to visit households, and experience real Chinese Lunar New Year greetings," said Ivan.
Aside from the shortage of employees, the express delivery industry faced numerous challenges due to the cold front that swept most of China.
From Jan. 20 to 24, the parcel deliveries in the country faced a series of delays caused by bad weather that amounted to a 20-percent slow down, according to statistics provided by Cainiao, the logistics arm of Alibaba.
Couriers continue to face other barriers to their smooth operations, like the increasingly congested traffic situation and frozen fuel tanks.
