Glossary → Peak surcharge
Peak surcharge.
the temporary per-parcel levy carriers add in the high-volume weeks, also sold as a demand surcharge
A charge stacked on the base rate for the weeks around Black Friday and Christmas, set per parcel and varying by service, by package characteristics, and by how far a shipper's weekly volume runs above an agreed baseline. Carriers announce the schedules ahead of the season on their own rate pages (FedEx keeps one), and those pages are built for browsers rather than for automated readers, so the numbers have to be read by a person and read again every year. POD carries this badly, because the surcharge peaks in the same weeks the order count does and the volume tiers are written to catch exactly that shape of shipper. The damage is set months earlier: a shop that priced flat-rate or free shipping in July pays the December rate out of the same margin. Quoting a Q4 shipping cost off a base rate card is quoting a number that will not exist in December.