Find Out Where You Lose People, and What It Costs
Warehouse and support attrition is high, expected and rarely examined. Our retention and attrition services start with the number: who leaves, from which shift and supervisor, how soon after joining, and what the loss costs in training, lower output and supplier premium. Then we help you act on the places where the loss concentrates and keep the people who matter before and after each peak.
The starting point
Is High Attrition Something You Measure or Something You Accept?
When attrition is high everywhere, it can become background noise. The figure is reported monthly, more agency staff are added and nobody looks at where the leaving starts.
We help you measure attrition in a way that shows where to act.
You may be experiencing:
- An attrition figure reported once a month, without a split by shift, supervisor, source or time since joining.
- Losses concentrated in the first fortnight, often after the first pay, with no one asking what happened.
- One or two supervisors whose teams lose far more people than the rest.
- The real cost of leaving, in training time, slower output and agency premium, never added up.
- No distinction between people you wanted to keep and those you were relieved to see go.
- Peak staff who do well but are never invited back, so you recruit again from scratch each season.
- Exit conversations that take place, if at all, only with office staff.
What we can help with
Our Retention and Attrition Management Services for E-commerce and D2C
Attrition Definition and Measurement
Agree what counts as a leaver, how rates are calculated and for which groups, so the number means the same thing in every centre and every month.
Analysis by Shift, Supervisor and Source
Break attrition down by shift, supervisor, hiring source, tenure and role to show where the loss concentrates and which pattern matters most.
First-Fortnight Review
Study early exits specifically: what people were told, the first pay, the first shift, transport and supervisor, and find which are fixable.
Regretted and Non-Regretted Split
Classify exits by whether you wanted to keep the person, so retention effort goes where it matters and relief exits are not treated as failures.
Cost of Attrition
Estimate the cost of replacing and retraining leavers, including slower output and agency premium, so management can compare it with the cost of retention actions.
Exit and Stay Conversations
Design short exit conversations for floor and support staff, and stay conversations for people you want to keep, with the questions to ask and the way to record answers.
Critical-Person Register
List the people whose loss would hurt a centre, a queue or a launch, and note what would keep each of them.
Retention Actions and Rehire Pool
Agree specific actions, such as roster fixes, pay timing or supervisor coaching, and keep a list of good peak workers to invite back.
The deliverables
What You Receive
Depending on scope, your engagement can include:
- An attrition definition note.
- An analysis of attrition by shift, supervisor, source and tenure.
- A study of first-fortnight exits.
- A regretted and non-regretted classification.
- A cost-of-attrition estimate.
- Exit and stay conversation formats.
- A critical-person register.
- A retention plan with owners and dates, and a rehire pool.
Step by step
How We Work
Fix the Definition
We agree what is counted and how, and gather leaver records from your centres and agencies.
Analyse Where It Happens
We break the data down by shift, supervisor, source and tenure and discuss patterns with your operations leaders.
Listen to Leavers and Stayers
We design and sometimes run short conversations with people who left and people you wish to keep.
Choose Actions
We shortlist actions with the best chance of helping, with your managers, and you decide which to take.
Review Against the Baseline
We compare early exits and attrition after the changes with the baseline taken at the start.
The difference
Act Where the Loss Actually Is
A clearer view of attrition helps you:
We do not promise outcomes. We record a baseline before work starts, covering attrition by shift and supervisor, first-fortnight exits, regretted exits and the estimated cost of replacing leavers, and report against it, so you can see what changed and what did not.
- Know where in the first weeks people leave.
- See which supervisors or shifts lose most.
- Separate losses you regret from those you do not.
- Add up the true cost of replacing staff.
- Keep the people who are hard to replace.
- Rebuild from a pool of good peak workers.
Find your fit
Who This Service Is For
Fulfilment Networks
Understand churn by centre, shift and supervisor.
Support Floors
Find out why agents leave and which ones you could keep.
Businesses Reliant on Peak Workers
Keep a pool of those who did well and want to return.
Fast-Growing D2C Brands
Protect scarce tech and growth talent.
Operators Using Agency Premiums
See what attrition really costs.
How it usually shows up in e-commerce and d2c
Warehouse and support attrition is high and expected, which is why it is rarely examined. The number is reported monthly and more agency staff are added. The loss tends to cluster under certain supervisors and in the first fortnight after joining, when people leave after the first pay. The cost of training, lower productivity and agency premiums for new staff is rarely added up. Where it is, it often exceeds the cost of keeping people.
Common challenges
Where it goes wrong in e-commerce and d2c
Agency top-ups hide the churn
The monthly figure is reported and more agency staff are added before sale week, so the exits behind it are not examined.
Late shifts lose the most pickers
Pickers and packers on one late shift or under one shift lead leave in larger numbers, and the warehouse figure covers it.
Pickers leave after the first payout
People who joined for the sale-week surge go after the first pay, before they reach pick rates, and nobody asks what they expected.
Mis-picks and returns follow new hands
Wrong picks, damaged parcels and agency premiums follow each new joiner, and the support team takes the customer calls.
A better process
What a working version looks like
- 01
Report by shift and supervisor
Show where the exits cluster and talk to those supervisors. The retention and attrition management work begins here.
- 02
Look at the first fortnight
Ask people who leave early what they expected and what they found.
- 03
Fix the shift that loses people
Coach the supervisor, review the roster and check conditions.
- 04
Cost one picker's exit
The cost of replacing a picker, including training, errors and the agency fee.
What to check this week
- Sort last quarter's exits by shift and supervisor.
- Ask five early leavers what they found different from what they were told.
- Find the productivity of a picker in the first fortnight.
- Compare the roster on a shift that loses people with one that does not.
- Add up the cost of replacing one picker.
Confirm with a qualified professional. What applies depends on your establishment, your state and your sector, and it changes. This page describes a practice; it does not state a legal position.
What this looks like in e-commerce and d2c
The parts of retention and attrition management that are specific to this sector, rather than general.
Retention Through and After Peak
Keeping people for the six weeks that matter.
What this coversHide
Retention Through and After Peak
Keeping people for the six weeks that matter.
What this coversHideE-commerce retention has two distinct questions: whether temporary staff last the peak, and whether permanent staff last the year. They have different causes and different remedies.
During peak
- Daily attrition tracked by shift and supervisor
- Roster, break and transport reliability
- Pay accuracy for a newly joined workforce
- First-week attrition as the key early signal
Across the year
- Permanent team attrition by function
- Supervisor-level attrition comparison
- Progression visibility for frontline staff
- Post-peak recovery and workload
First-week attrition during peak is the most actionable number available. It usually points to onboarding or to one supervisor, and both are fixable inside the season.
Questions on this, in e-commerce and d2c
It is often the most actionable number available. It tends to point to a gap between what was promised and the work, to a pay-timing problem or to one supervisor, and each of these can be fixed.
We agree definitions for each group: employees, agency staff and seasonal workers, and calculate them separately and together. That avoids a blended figure that hides where the loss really sits.
It is an exit of someone you would have wanted to keep, for example a strong performer or a scarce skill. Separating these from other exits focuses retention effort on people who matter.
We estimate it from training time, lower output, supplier premium and recruitment effort, using your own data. The result is an estimate, and we state the assumptions behind it.
First confirm that the pattern is real across several months. Then look at roster, behaviour and workload, and agree a coaching or structural response. The decision about the person is yours.
Yes. Leaver records, attrition views by shift and supervisor, and reminders for stay conversations can be configured on the GullyHR platform or on your own system.
Yes. Not every exit is a loss, and part of the work is separating exits you regret from those you do not. The aim is to reduce the avoidable losses, and not to drive the number to zero.
Early-exit patterns can often be seen within one hiring cycle, since they show up in the first fortnight. Longer-term attrition takes more cycles, and we report against the baseline throughout.
Some of it is. The part that clusters under certain supervisors or in the first fortnight is not, and that part is worth fixing.
Be honest at hiring, run a short induction, pay on a reliable date and have a supervisor who helps. Most early exits are about expectations and the first week.
The agency fee or hiring cost, the training time and the lower output and higher errors while the new person learns. It is usually more than the monthly wage.
Check first where the loss sits. If it is one shift or one supervisor, pay will not fix it.
Ask why, listen and see whether anything can be changed, such as shift, partner or pay. A conversation at this point keeps more people than a counter-offer at the last day.
Understand Why People Leave, and Act on It
Tell us what you know about attrition today, and we will help you see where it concentrates.
Prefer to talk first? Call +91 80958 58589 or write to hello@gullyhr.com.
Book a Retention Consultation
Tell us about your teams and where you lose people.
The general method — what retention and attrition management covers, the questions it answers and what an engagement produces — is the same whatever the sector, and is set out on the employee retention and attrition management page. What is above is the part that differs for e-commerce and d2c.
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Where to start
Most engagements begin with a review of how this runs in your business today, then a written process and the sequence to implement it.
See all HR topics for e-commerce and d2c, or another industry.