At a glance
Live count of open Deutsche Post / DHL claims and search investigations (Nachforschungsauftrag for lost or damaged parcels, plus loss / damage compensation claims) that have not yet been resolved or paid. This is the money-recovery and aged-case dial. Each open claim is either compensation the merchant is owed for a lost or damaged parcel, or a customer waiting on a resolution. The alert fires when any claim has sat unresolved for more than 7 days, because aged claims are the ones that get forgotten, breach DHL’s own response window, and turn into a refunded order the merchant never recovers from the carrier.
Calculation
Calculated automatically from your Deutsche Post data. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading.Worked example
Same Cologne-based DTC skincare brand, around 3,900 outbound DHL parcels per week. Reading taken at 09:00 CEST on 14 Apr 26. The claim pipeline is a real-time snapshot, not a trailing window.
The card reads 18 open claims, and the alert is tripped: 6 cases are older than 7 days. Five things to notice:
- The alert is about age, not volume. 18 open claims for a 3,900-parcel-week merchant is unremarkable. The signal is that 6 of them have aged past a week. Aged claims are the ones a busy CS team loses track of, and the ones most likely to breach DHL’s own handling window and lapse.
- Loss claims have a hard clock. DHL’s compensation process for a lost domestic DHL Paket runs through a Nachforschungsauftrag first; only once the search concludes “not found” does a Verlust claim pay out, typically up to the product’s liability cap unless additional cover (höhere Versicherung) was booked. The 2 aged loss cases here are recoverable money sitting idle: chase them.
- Each open claim usually has a refunded customer behind it. The brand has almost certainly already refunded or reshipped the 9 search cases to keep the customer happy. The claim is how it recovers that cost from DHL. An open claim that lapses is a refund the merchant eats.
- Damage claims need fast evidence. Beschädigung claims depend on photos and, often, retention of the damaged packaging. The 1 aged damage case risks rejection if the evidence window closes. Resolve damage claims first because they decay fastest.
- Watch the conversion from late to claim. The Late Shipments card showed 167 late this week; at a 10 to 25 percent escalation rate, expect a fresh wave of search investigations to land here over the next fortnight. Staff the claim queue ahead of the wave, not behind it.
Sibling cards merchants should reference together
Open claims is the recovery-and-aged-case dial. Pair it with these to manage the funnel:Reconciling against the source
Where to look in DHL’s own tooling: The authoritative record is the DHL Geschäftskundenportal (Business Customer Portal) → Nachforschung / Reklamation (search / claims) area, which lists every open Nachforschungsauftrag and compensation claim with its current status and case reference. The public DHL Sendungsverfolgung shows the parcel-level event history that triggered the case. For compensation policy and liability caps, the DHL Paket terms (AGB) and the account contract are the reference. The closest like-for-like view is all open cases, status not closed, outbound only. Why our number may legitimately differ from DHL’s portal:
Cross-connector reconciliation:
Known limitations / merchant FAQs
Why does the alert fire on a single old claim when my total is low? By design. The trigger is age-based (>0 unresolved >7d), not volume-based. A small but ageing claim queue is the failure mode this card guards against: claims that get forgotten, breach DHL’s handling window, and lapse into refunds the merchant never recovers. One stale case is enough to warrant a look.
What is the difference between a Nachforschungsauftrag and a loss claim?
A Nachforschungsauftrag is a search investigation: you tell DHL a parcel has not arrived and DHL tries to locate it. A loss claim (Verlust) is the compensation request once the search concludes the parcel is gone. The card counts both as open until they reach a terminal state. Operationally, a parcel almost always passes through a search before it becomes a paid loss claim.
How much can I recover, and is it worth chasing small claims?
DHL’s standard liability on a domestic DHL Paket is capped per parcel unless you booked additional cover (höhere Versicherung). For low-value orders the cap may be below your retail price, so the recoverable amount is the carrier’s liability, not your full refund. Read this card with Claim Value (open) to decide where to spend effort: chase the high-value aged cases first.
Why might my portal show a claim resolved that this card still shows open?
Status-sync latency. When DHL closes a case in the Geschäftskundenportal, the card reflects it on the next sync rather than instantly. If a case you just closed still reads open, give it a sync cycle before treating it as a real discrepancy.
Do damage claims work differently from loss claims?
Yes, and they decay faster. Beschädigung (damage) claims usually require photographic evidence and, often, retention of the damaged packaging within a short window. If the evidence window closes the claim is likely rejected. Prioritise aged damage cases over aged search cases for that reason.
How do I stop claims ageing past 7 days?
Treat the claim queue as a daily standing task, not an ad-hoc one. Two practical steps: (1) assign a single owner for the DHL claim queue so cases do not fall between CS agents, and (2) use the Late Shipments and Failed Deliveries cards to staff ahead of the incoming wave rather than reacting after the customer chases.
Does a returned-to-sender parcel count as an open claim?
No. An RTS parcel is a different outcome: the goods came back rather than going missing. It is on Returned to Sender. A claim is for parcels that are lost or damaged, not for parcels that bounced back to the warehouse.