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If you’re just starting work as a courier, you may find the following guide useful. That’s because it is a secret and mysterious world, alongside which, the contorted secret societies outlined in the Da Vinci Code simply pale into insignificance. So, to help, this article hasn’t been hidden in a secret code-locked cylinder or written in a cipher that nobody’s understood for millennia – it’s in plain English, but all to be taken with a large grain of salt!

Getting invited to join

If you’re looking to join a courier company, you will sooner or later be invited to meet ‘The Grand and Omnipotent Master’. He or she will masquerade under a friendly title such as ‘The Head Of HR’, or perhaps ‘The Chief Dispatcher’ or maybe just ‘The Boss’ – but don’t be misled. This being has immense power and the knowledge of ages behind them. To secure their approval in the selection ceremony, you’ll have to prove yourself a worthy applicant by performing certain rituals.

These will typically include:
• Demonstrating your mastery of the false laugh as they unleash some time-weathered jokes and humorous remarks
• Reciting the specified rituals of humiliation by explaining just how much you want to join their secret society (or ‘company’ as they may insist you call it when speaking with outsiders)
• Pretending to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of any non-job related subject they raise (usually sport, pubs/clubs, steam engines etc).

Beware of trick questions designed to catch-out the unwary supplicant. These are usually cunningly disguised such as “do you have ambition?” Any answer other than a “NO” may be interpreted as a threat to The Grand Master’s position.

Initiation

If you survive the initial selection meeting, you may receive an invitation to join the courier brotherhood (no gender bias is implied in today’s world – the title is merely a historical hang-over from Medieval times). You’ll be given a joining date upon which you’ll present yourself at a specified secret location (it’s secret to stop a special type of outsider called ‘the customer’ from finding it). You’ll probably find that the Grand Master Courier has vanished, very possibly never to be seen again by mere ordinary members. You’ll find a fellow member, possibly called ‘him/her in the office’, that will probably welcome you with the traditional secret greeting, which is a very hard-to-recognise grunt and nod in your general direction.
If you’re lucky, you may be provided with your regalia (which with outsiders we describe as our ‘uniform’ or ‘overalls’) to which your response must be “I’ll look fine in this”. You’ll also be handed your personal book of secrets, which may be deceptively entitled ‘Delivery Schedules’ just to fool snoops. The book of secrets is a mysterious and very hard to decipher document that you’ll need to progress up the courier hierarchy to the level of a full ‘him/her in the office’ to understand. Its main purpose for initiates is its use to intimidate onlookers.

Rites of passage

Your first day as an initiate (as indeed every subsequent day) will commence with the ancient ritual performed with him/her in the office (HHITO).
Your guide to the liturgy is given here:
HHITO: “Are you still here?”
You: “…my book of secrets needs updating..”
HHITO: “you’ll be asking for full delivery addresses next”
You: “how am I meant to find this place without a postcode or town?”
HHITO: “You’re a courier – use your initiative and ask someone”
You: “I am eternally grateful for your benign guidance”
HHITO: “Next!”
If this sounds strange, bizarre and exotic – it’s meant to. But, once this becomes routine and normal and you start finding it all makes sense, then you’ll finally be a true courier.

Norman Dulwich is a correspondent for Courier Exchange, the world’s largest neutral trading hub for the same day courier and express freight exchange industry. Over 2,500 transport exchange businesses are networked together through their website, trading courier jobs and capacity in a safe ‘wholesale’ environment.

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