At a glance
Real-time count of DHL InExpress claims you have filed that are not yet resolved (paid out, denied, or withdrawn). Each open claim is unrecovered cash plus a customer in limbo. The card lights up when any claim has been open >7 days, the typical investigation window for a routine loss-or-damage claim.
| What it counts | COUNT(claims WHERE status IN ('Open','Investigating','PendingDocumentation','Submitted')). Polls the /claims endpoint live; figure refreshes within 5 minutes of a claim status change. |
| Claim types | Lost-in-network, damage-on-arrival, missing-contents, late-delivery (where the merchant SLA contract supports it), incorrect-charges. Each claim has its own DHL claim reference and a separately tracked compensation amount. |
| Multi-carrier opacity | Claims are filed against DHL InExpress as the contract carrier, regardless of which sub-carrier (Yodel, Evri, etc.) actually caused the issue. DHL handles upstream recovery from sub-carriers; the merchant deals with DHL only. |
| Brexit / customs | Lost-in-customs and held-indefinitely-by-customs are valid claim types post-Brexit and are usually slower to resolve (15 to 30 days vs 7 to 14 for in-network losses). |
| Resolution scope | A claim is “closed” when DHL marks it Paid, Denied, or Withdrawn. A claim awaiting merchant documentation is still open. |
| Currency | The card is unitless (count). For the cash impact, see Claim Value (open). |
| Time window | RT (real-time). Each unresolved claim contributes 1 until it closes. |
| Alert trigger | >0 unresolved >7d. The card flags whenever a single claim has been open more than 7 days; this is DHL’s typical processing target. |
| Roles | owner, operations, finance |
Calculation
Calculated automatically from your DHL InExpress data. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading.Worked example
A UK gifts retailer with ~5,000 InExpress shipments per month. Reading taken at 09:00 GMT on 12 Mar 26 (real-time).| Claim type | Count | Median age (days) | Aggregate value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lost in network (UK domestic) | 4 | 5 | £420 |
| Damage on arrival | 6 | 11 | £680 |
| Lost at customs (UK to FR) | 2 | 22 | £290 |
| Missing contents (partial-pack stolen) | 1 | 9 | £45 |
| Total open (this card) | 13 | £1,435 |
>0 unresolved >7d is tripped (9 of the 13 are over 7 days old). Five things to notice:
- Aged claims are the operational signal, not the count. 13 open claims on 5,000 shipments (0.26%) is fine in volume terms. The 22-day customs claim and the 11-day median damage claims are the issue. DHL’s stated 7-day target has been blown on most of these. Escalate via your DHL account manager.
- Damage on arrival is your biggest cluster. 6 claims worth £680, investigate root cause. Is it a packaging change? A new SKU with fragile contents? Audit the recent damaged shipments for a common factor.
- Customs claims take 3 to 4x longer to resolve. Post-Brexit, parcels lost at customs require multi-agency investigation (DHL, HMRC, EU customs office). Set internal expectation: customs claims are 15 to 30 days, not 7.
- The £1,435 isn’t recovered yet. Claim Value (open) shows the cash exposure. Until DHL pays, this is unrecovered loss on your balance sheet, flag to finance for proactive provisioning.
- Each open claim is a customer in limbo. Even if you’ve already refunded the customer (good practice), they remember the bad experience. NPS hit is roughly 30 to 50 points per claim experience versus a smooth delivery; lifecycle revenue impact is the real cost.
Sibling cards merchants should reference together
Open claims is the unresolved-cash counter. Pair with cause and value:| Card | Why pair it | What the combination tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Claim Value (open) | The £/€ figure for the same claims. | Use the count for ageing alerts and the value for finance provisioning. |
| Exception Rate | Upstream cause. ~5 to 15% of exceptions become claims. | A 1pp exception spike predicts 0.1 to 0.3pp claim rise at 1 to 3 weeks lag. |
| Late Shipments | Late shipments are a leading indicator for damage and lost-in-network claims (parcels that get stuck and damaged in storage). | Climbing late count + climbing claims = network capacity strain. |
| Returned to Sender | RTO often precedes a missing-contents claim if the parcel is returned partially repacked. | Climbing RTO with claims rising suggests handling damage in returns flow. |
| Failed Deliveries | Damage and theft can occur during failed-delivery retries. | Cluster of failed deliveries followed by missing-contents claims = handling chain investigation needed. |
Reconciling against the vendor’s own dashboard
Where to look in DHL InExpress’s own dashboard: MyDHL+ portal → Claims → Open Claims. Each row is one open claim with reference, status, age, and compensation amount. The card sums the row count forstatus NOT IN ('Closed','Paid','Denied','Withdrawn').
Why our number may legitimately differ from MyDHL+:
| Reason | Direction | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Status sync lag | Either | Claim status changes propagate from DHL’s claims-handling system to the API within 5 to 15 minutes typically. Status flips during this window can show different counts on portal vs card. |
PendingDocumentation filter | Either | Some merchants treat PendingDocumentation (DHL is waiting for the merchant to upload paperwork) as “closed on our side”. The card counts these as open because DHL still considers them open. To match the portal’s “needs your action” filter, exclude this status. |
| Withdrawn claims | Ours higher briefly | Claims you withdraw take 1 to 24 hours to flip to Withdrawn status. The portal often updates faster than the API. |
| Time zone | Marginal | Both card and portal use real-time timestamps; time-zone effects are negligible for a real-time count. |
| Card | Expected relationship | What causes legitimate divergence |
|---|---|---|
| Internal claims-handling tool (Zendesk, Gorgias, etc.) | Independent count if the merchant logs claims locally. | Logging discipline, multi-step claim flows. |
| Finance ledger receivable for “DHL claims pending” | The accounting view of the same exposure. | Timing of GL bookings, recovery accruals. |
dhl_open_claims = COUNT(claims with status != closed). The card and Claim Value (open) read the same population from /claims with one returning count and the other returning sum-of-amounts.
Known limitations / merchant FAQs
A claim has been open for 30 days. Should I just write it off? Not yet. Customs-related claims legitimately take 15 to 30 days; non-customs claims open this long mean DHL is stuck on internal investigation. Three actions in order: (1) check the claim status (PendingDocumentation means DHL is waiting on you, upload immediately), (2) chase via your DHL account manager with the claim reference, (3) escalate to DHL’s claims supervisor if status hasn’t moved in 14 days.
How do I file a claim?
MyDHL+ → Claims → New Claim. You’ll need the AWB (air waybill), proof of value (invoice, receipt), and damage photos for damage claims. The claim form is online and submission is immediate; investigation takes 7 to 14 days for routine claims, 15 to 30 days for customs-related claims.
What’s DHL’s coverage limit for InExpress?
Default declared value coverage is £100 (or local equivalent) for InExpress. Higher coverage requires you to declare value at label generation and pay an additional premium (typically 1 to 2% of declared value). Without declared value, claims are capped at the default; this is why high-value shipments need declared value upfront.
Is the open-claim count exclusive of withdrawn claims?
Withdrawn claims close immediately and are excluded. If you withdraw a claim and it still appears on the card, it’s a sync lag, refresh in 5 to 15 minutes.
Can I see who filed each claim?
The card surfaces the count and ageing only. To see per-claim detail (filer, AWB, type, amount, status), go to MyDHL+ Claims; or use Claim Value (open) for the cash view. A drill-through is on the roadmap.
My open count won’t go to zero. Why?
Steady-state for an InExpress merchant doing >2,000 shipments per month is typically 5 to 15 open claims at any time, with new ones flowing in as old ones resolve. Zero is unrealistic; the goal is “no claim older than 14 days unresolved without a status update”.
What’s the difference between “Submitted” and “Investigating”?
Submitted = you filed it, DHL has not yet assigned an investigator. Investigating = DHL is actively working on it (locating the parcel, contacting depots, etc.). Submitted-stuck claims for >48h are an escalation signal, they shouldn’t sit in queue.
Does the card include claims for parcels not yet delivered?
Yes. A parcel reported lost-in-transit can have a claim filed before its estimatedDeliveryDate. The card counts the claim from filing date onward.