Transport & storage homeworking use rockets five-fold, outpacing manufacturing and retail

Sep 19, 2026 Warehousing Ireland Logistics, News Comments Off on Transport & storage homeworking use rockets five-fold, outpacing manufacturing and retail

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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. It says manufacturing’s flexible working has also surged while wholesale & retail has slipped back.

 

New analysis of the Government’s Business Insights and Conditions Survey (BICS) reveals a dramatic turnaround in the transportation & storage sector’s attitude to homeworking, with the proportion of businesses using, or intending to use, increased homeworking as a permanent model rocketing more than five-fold in a year.

Analysis of the latest wave of the survey, covering 17 to 30 August 2026, by Parcelhero, the delivery exper eveals that 14.1% of transport and storage businesses said they were using or intending to use increased homeworking permanently. That compares with just 2.8% twelve months earlier, in the equivalent wave covering August 2025 – an increase of over 11 percentage points and the sector’s strongest showing in more than two years of tracking.

Parcelhero’s Head of Consumer Research, David Jinks M.I.L.T., says:  ‘The rise means transport & storage, historically one of the survey’s most hands-on, site-based sectors, has now all but closed the gap on manufacturing, and moved ahead of wholesale & retail on this measure for the first time in several waves.

‘Manufacturing also posted a strong increase, with 14.8% of businesses now using or planning increased homeworking, up from 7.7% a year ago – a near-doubling, and a jump of five percentage points in just the last quarter alone (from 9.8% in May 2026).

‘The responses from the wholesale & retail sector told a different story. Just 12.2% of businesses in that sector reported increased homeworking plans in August 2026, down from 18.% only three months earlier in May, and slightly below the 14.1% recorded a year ago in August 2025 – a rare sector-wide pull-back after several waves of steady growth.

‘It’s genuinely striking to see transport & storage – a sector built around drivers, warehouse staff and dispatch teams who simply can’t do their core job from the kitchen table – recording one of the sharpest rises in homeworking adoption of any sector we track. A year ago, fewer than 3 in 100 transport and logistics firms were embracing increased homeworking as a permanent model; now it’s more than 14 in 100, similar to manufacturing.

‘What’s likely happening is that back-office, planning, customer service and fleet management functions within transport and logistics businesses are increasingly being shifted to home or hybrid working, even while the frontline delivery operation stays firmly on the road. Manufacturing is on a similar trajectory, with more back-office and design functions moving home. It shows homeworking is no longer just an option for desk-based, digital sectors.

‘Retail and wholesale, by contrast, appears to be pulling back on homeworking plans after a strong start to the year. With physical footfall and in-store operations central to that sector, it may be that some retailers are reassessing hybrid arrangements as trading conditions evolve.

‘The BICS survey has tracked homeworking intentions since September 2020. Both transport & storage and wholesale & retail have historically recorded some of the lowest homeworking figures of any sector, reflecting the physical, customer-facing nature of much of the work, making the latest jump in transport & storage especially notable. However, there is one caveat we would add. Transport & Storage sample sizes have historically been smaller for this question than other sectors, and several earlier waves show suppressed or volatile figures; this should be taken into account when interpreting quarter-to-quarter movements.

‘Even allowing for this note of caution, however, this jump in flexible working in logistics is remarkable. What remains to be seen is the impact of AI on flexible work practices within the industry. Parcelhero’s recent research indicates that AI will change working patterns within logistics but not have the serious impact on job numbers some analysts had feared. Parcelhero’s new report, “Putting the AI into supply chAIns”, explores how artificial intelligence is reshaping logistics, warehousing, shipping, freight and the future of global trade

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