Nearly half of Chinese couriers have to work 10 to 12 hours a day, and 21.4 percent of them say their daily work time exceeds 12 hours, according to a recent survey.
The survey, covering 5,279 couriers nationwide, was led by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China and State Post Bureau. And a report about the survey was carried by China Youth Daily Tuesday.
The survey showed that 48.9 percent of the couriers only have one day off every week.
In terms of workload, 31 percent of the respondents said that they delivered more than 100 packages a day, adding that the workload was much bigger during shopping peaks such as the Nov. 11 Single's Day.
Statistics from 2017 showed that Chinese couriers were relatively well paid, earning an average salary of 4,859 yuan (about 725.7 U.S. dollars) a month, 27.4 percent higher than the average salary of other private company employees.
High salaries, however, come at the price of long work hours and heavy workloads. Up to 55.8 percent of the survey takers said that their salary depended on the number of goods they delivered, which was a cause of excessive workload.