Parcelhero warns that the new €2 EU handling charge and mandatory Product Identifiers for every item, introduced on 1 November, are landing on top of July’s new €3 customs duty fee just as Christmas parcel volumes peak. The charges are applied per product line, so a parcel of mixed items can quickly rack up a bill. Parcelhero warns the new charges and paperwork could put up the price of UK goods sold to EU consumers just before Christmas and are likely to cause delays.

Halloween falls on a Saturday this year, and with Boo Boxes turning parcels into the main event, Parcelhero predicts UK spending will climb 6% on last year’s £1bn. It’s not just kids: adults are boxing clever too.

New ONS data analysed by Parcelhero shows worry over fuel costs has jumped across UK industry since the summer. Transport & storage businesses remain the most acutely exposed, while manufacturing concern has more than doubled.

The Weston family's agreed takeover of Boots is the latest chapter in a decade of upheaval for UK pharmacy, as online prescription services, private equity break-ups and relentless closures redraw the high street. The home delivery expert Parcelhero argues that the real prize is not Boots' stores but its place in a health market that is moving online.

Official ONS figures show the number of transport & storage sector businesses reporting lower turnover more than doubled in a month, while almost none saw growth. The home delivery expert Parcelhero says the sector’s expectations for October are weak, with only 6.1% of firms forecasting growth, compared with 23.5% of manufacturers.

Online sales values rose 2.5% in August and non-store retail volumes grew 1.7%, recovering more than half of July's slump, with online spending now 8.9% higher than a year ago. Parcelhero says July's dip was a hangover from June's heatwave and promotions, not a sign of e-commerce losing momentum.

Could being in a delivery drone corridor soon boost the value of your house? Our new industry report, 'Delivering the Future', predicts how deliveries will keep shrinking to minutes by 2030. It also explores far-future scenarios stretching from underground freight tunnels to quantum teleportation.

Delivery and logistics firms have gone from being the least likely UK sector to embrace homeworking to one of the fastest-growing, new analysis of ONS data by the delivery expert Parcelhero shows.

While the demise of our local pubs is capturing the headlines, another great British institution is in equal danger of vanishing from our towns and cities. From WHSmith's disappearance and its successor TG Jones's shaky finances, to years of turmoil at Clintons and Paperchase, Parcelhero's warnings about the decline of newsagents and stationers are being borne out chain by chain.

New data shows just 9.7% of transport and storage businesses expect to raise prices in September – the lowest of any major UK sector, and down sharply from 15.8% in August. Manufacturers and retailers, by contrast, are far more likely to be pushing prices up, says the delivery expert Parcelhero.