A courier service is a company that collects goods or documents from one address and delivers them to another, faster and with more care than ordinary post: collection from your door, tracking on the way, and a signature at the other end. This guide from First Choice Transportation Ltd explains how courier services work and the main types.
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A courier is a person or company that carries something from one place to another on someone else’s behalf. In everyday UK use it means a delivery business that comes to you, rather than one you take your item to, and that takes responsibility for it until the recipient has it.
What a courier does, in practice: collects the item, checks it, carries it by the quickest suitable route, keeps the sender informed, and hands it over against a signature. A courier company is the business behind that; the driver or rider who does the job is also called a courier.
See our own courier service for how we do it.
The word comes from the French courrier and the Latin currere, “to run”: the first couriers were runners and riders carrying messages. The dictionary definition of a courier is still a messenger who carries goods or documents for someone else.
In the UK the word has a second, older meaning: a holiday courier, the travel company’s representative who looks after a tour group. On a delivery or business website, courier always means the first: someone who carries your goods.
There are two models, and they work very differently:
Most businesses use both: a network for routine parcels and a same day courier when something cannot wait or will not fit.
One vehicle, collected and delivered the same day, direct.
Booked and collected straight away when something has gone wrong.
Collected today, delivered tomorrow, by network or dedicated van.
Driven through the night for an early-morning deadline.
Items too big or heavy for a parcel network, carried by van.
Contract and specialist work: samples, legal documents, stock, parts.
| Postal service | Courier service | |
|---|---|---|
| Collection | You post it or take it to a counter | Collected from your door |
| Speed | Next day at best, often 2 to 3 days | Same day, overnight or next day |
| Handling | Sorted by machine with millions of items | Network: depot sorted; dedicated: driven direct |
| Tracking | Only on tracked services | Usually standard |
| Proof of delivery | Only on signed-for services | Usually standard: signature, often a photo |
| Cost | Lowest per item | Higher, priced by size, weight or distance |
The difference between courier and post comes down to control: with a courier, someone is responsible for your item from collection to proof of delivery.
Advantages:
Disadvantages:
Prices for our own service are on the courier prices page.
Not quite. Delivery is the act of bringing goods to someone; a courier is the person or company doing it, usually with collection from your door, tracking and a signature at the other end. Every courier makes deliveries, but a shop van or the post also delivers without being a courier service.
Royal Mail is the UK’s postal service: it collects, sorts and delivers letters and parcels to every UK address at a uniform price, under a legal universal service obligation. Its parcel arm, Parcelforce Worldwide, works as a courier, with tracked, timed deliveries. So Royal Mail letters are post; Parcelforce parcels are courier.
Parcel networks such as DPD, Evri, DHL, UPS and FedEx are couriers that carry millions of parcels through depots. Same day couriers are the other kind: a single driver collects your item and takes it straight to the recipient. First Choice Transportation Ltd is a same day courier based in Southgate, North London.
Almost anything that is legal to carry: documents, parcels, furniture, stock, machinery parts, laboratory samples and exhibition kit. Dangerous goods, such as flammable liquids or batteries in bulk, need declaring and special packing. Each courier sets its own limits on size and weight; a van courier is limited only by the vehicle.
A small parcel through a network can cost a few pounds; a dedicated van is priced by distance. First Choice Transportation charges £40 for the first 10 miles then £1.25 a mile in a car or small van, and £60 then £1.80 a mile in a long wheelbase or Luton van, plus VAT.
A dedicated van courier: one driver and one vehicle per job, collected within 30 to 45 minutes across London and within the hour elsewhere in the UK, 24 hours a day. The driver checks the goods, goes direct, and the recipient signs, with a photo texted to you. Call 020 8202 2008.
First Choice Transportation Ltd is a registered UK company (No. 15276847) based in Southgate, North London, founded by Allam, who has 15 years’ experience in courier and transport work, with 30 drivers across the UK.
No depot and no sorting: the driver who collects it delivers it, direct.
30 to 45 minutes across London and the Home Counties; 45 minutes to an hour elsewhere, 24 hours a day.
£40 for the first 10 miles, then £1.25 a mile in a car or small van, plus VAT.
Signature and photo on handover, texted to you.
