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Festive readiness checklist

Diwali lands on Sunday, November 8, 2026 — and the sale season runs weeks before it. What Indian D2C and logistics teams lock before the peak, in what order, with dates. Print it, pin it to the ops wall, tick items off as they land.

21 ITEMSDIWALI: SUN, NOV 8PROXIMAAGENTS.COM

Printable checklist

Festive readiness checklist: August to Diwali.

Diwali sale volume doubles or triples daily parcels, and temp hiring breaks first. This is the readiness checklist from our festive season logistics post, laid out to print and pin to the ops wall. Tick items off as they land.

Download the PDF

Aug 1–31 August: capacity and baselines

Lock committed daily volumes with your primary courier — Delhivery, Xpressbees, Ekart or Blue Dart — for the peak weeks.
Get the festive surcharge terms in writing, per courier and per lane.
Sign a backup courier rate card for your top lanes before you need it. In October, couriers ration capacity to whoever committed first.
Measure what share of COD orders gets a confirmation message today. That coverage number is the August baseline.
Start WhatsApp template and consent-flow approvals for COD confirmation. Approvals take weeks, which is why this starts now.
Record the August baseline for RTO rate and NDR-to-RTO conversion, by courier and category. Every peak number gets compared against this.

Sep 1–30 September: response time and testing

COD confirmation live on WhatsApp for every COD order, with a prepaid nudge inside the same message.
Pull your median time from NDR event to customer contact. If it is measured in hours or days, fix it now — the peak triples the daily NDR count.
Address verification at checkout: pin-code validation, landmark prompt, phone-number check.
Test automation in Shadow mode on the routine categories: COD confirmation, NDR first response, missed-scan follow-ups, WISMO answers. Suggestions scored against what the team actually does.
Freeze every new automation category by September 15. Only categories with a proven approval record run during the peak.
Proactive delivery updates and self-serve tracking answers built and load-tested before the first sale day — not during it.

Oct 1 – Nov 10 Peak weeks: ownership and discipline

Every exception category has one owner and one written playbook. The test: at 21:00 on a peak Tuesday, no case sits unowned.
Every NDR gets a customer message the same hour, with the re-attempt instruction back to the courier before the next attempt.
Only proven categories run automatically, inside agreed limits. High-value RTO decisions, damaged-goods disputes and SLA escalations stay with supervisors.
Review RTO rate and NDR-to-RTO conversion against the August baseline every week, by reason code.

Nov 11–27 Post-peak: the review

Book the post-peak review before the peak starts, for the week of November 16, while the numbers are still fresh.
Which checklist items held and which broke — with numbers, not impressions.
Actual RTO and NDR profile against the August baseline, and what each recovered NDR saved at ₹150–₹250 a parcel.
Which automated categories stayed accurate under triple volume, and which graduate to less supervision.
Write the playbook for the next peak. Year-end sales are weeks away, and the marketplace events return every year.

Want a second pair of eyes on your peak plan? We walk this checklist against your actual couriers and volumes in a free two-day process review. There is no charge and no obligation to proceed. proximaagents.com/diagnostic

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