Specialist for Mail and Freight Traffic

While Germany's shopping malls and plazas fight for their existence, online shopping is booming. It is simply too comfortable to just snatch your tablet, go online, and purchase everything you need from home. Online shopping will typically require to send the goods to the purchaser. "All of sudden", van drivers are needed like crazy.

Tasks of a Specialist for Mail and Freight Traffic

Specialists in courier, express and postal services deliver letters, parcels, and packages, which are sorted either by hand or with the help of machines. For delivery, where they wear company clothing, the specialists use cars, bicycles or delivery trolleys. During their work, they alternate between working outdoors or in mail and freight centers: during delivery, they are exposed to the weather, while in the sorting centers, they are exposed to machine noise. In delivery, the working day usually starts early in the morning, whereas in sorting centers they also work at night.

The work of this specialist requires good physical condition, e.g. when vehicles have to be loaded or long distances have to be covered on foot. The flawless issuing of freight documents requires a high degree of care and concentration. They need excellent spatial vision and orientation skills to steer bicycles, cars, and trucks. As the specialists can have some customer contact when they collect and deliver consignments from customers or accept complaints, customer and service orientation play a major role.

Language Skills

German language skills are not officially required. However, you will practically need at least A1 to read and understand street signs and names on doorbells and to make your way around – all this despite navigators.

Acknowledgment of a Foreign Degree

No professional recognition is required to work in this profession with a qualification acquired abroad. However, a determination of equivalence can help German employers to better assess the professional skills acquired abroad. However, this recognition is subject to a fee and takes longer.

Persons over 45 Years

If you are 45 years or older, you also have to receive a salary of at least € 4015 in western Germany resp. € 3905 for eastern Germany. If your salary is lower than that threshold, you will have to show an adequate pension plan or other retirement provisions. This coverage can be either the state pension plan from home, private savings, closing a German pension plan, or a mixture of all. The government wants to make sure that you will not be dependent on welfare upon retiring.

N.B. This detail is only relevant for the very first permit!