FedEx UK Limited & FedEx Express UK Limited (“FedEx”)

This is the fourth annual Modern Slavery Statement to be published by FedEx. This statement covers both FedEx UK Limited and FedEx Express UK Limited, for financial year ending 31st May 2020. See here for FedEx’s 2019, 2018 and 2017 statements.

Lawful and ethical behaviour is of paramount importance to FedEx and is critical to our continued success. The FedEx Code of Business Conduct and Ethics makes it clear that this is a requirement for all of our employees and places similar obligations upon suppliers to FedEx. As part of this requirement FedEx is committed to protecting and advancing human rights in all of our operations wherever they may be in the world.

This statement outlines the steps FedEx has taken to minimise the risk of modern slavery in its business and its supply chains in the last financial year and sets out FedEx’s future plans.

Within the United Kingdom FedEx provides international and domestic delivery services and mainly operates through two companies, FedEx Express UK Limited and FedEx UK Limited. 

FedEx has a large and complex supply chain and has many direct supply arrangements on a global basis and on an individual in country basis.

For more information on the FedEx companies operating in the UK and our supply chains, see our 2017 statement.

The FedEx Code of Business Conduct and Ethics sets out the expectations that are relevant for all of our employees and for our suppliers wherever we do business in the world.  Doing business in an ethical and responsible manner is already enshrined within our current set of policies and procedures. These policies and procedures help to ensure that Slavery and Human Trafficking do not occur within our business or our supply chains.  For more detail on the relevant FedEx policies, see our 2017 statement. 

We continue to maintain our strong culture of ethics and integrity that supports and encourages compliance with these internal policies. 

We are committed to ensuring there is transparency in our business and in our approach to tackling modern slavery throughout our supply chains. We fully expect the same high standards from our suppliers. We will check our high risk suppliers comply with our standards by asking them to complete our Modern Slavery Supplier Questionnaire.  This Questionnaire asks suppliers to confirm, amongst other things, what steps they are taking to mitigate risks of modern slavery taking place in their own supply chains.

We ensure new suppliers have agreed to our high standards on Modern Slavery from the outset of the procurement process by; ensuring they agree to our tendering guidelines where applicable, including a clause requiring compliance with the Modern Slavery Act in all of our bespoke supplier contracts and requiring new suppliers to confirm their compliance with our standards on Modern Slavery by completing an on-boarding questionnaire.

We aim to mitigate risk by maintaining our policy on Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking and maintaining the FedEx Alert Line. This line can be accessed by all FedEx employees or any other person who wishes to raise a concern. We encourage employees and other parties to raise concerns about any issue or suspicion of modern slavery through the FedEx Alert Line. All reports received through the FedEx Alert Line are acted upon promptly. FedEx employees are also encouraged to report modern slavery issues or concerns in accordance with FedEx’s Open Door and Whistleblowing policies without fear of reprisal or retribution.

We provide mandatory training sessions once a year on the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and its requirements to our procurement function, being the function most directly involved with suppliers. This year we have extended this training to the HR function. These training sessions are presented by the Legal function to educate employees on Modern Slavery and our obligations under the Government’s legislation and to outline the steps which need to be taken each year to proactively monitor our supply chains and identify any risk of Modern Slavery occurring.

During the next financial year, we will continue to:

• Seek to source our supplies in a responsible manner;
• Include modern slavery contractual provisions in its contracts with new suppliers;
• Expect and require our suppliers to operate in full compliance with all applicable laws;
• Maintain our high standards and identify ways to further enhance this;
• Review contractual terms for suppliers in relation to Modern Slavery;
• Look into conducting random audits on a select group of our high risk suppliers.

Governance and Citizenship. Further information can be found at: https://about.van.fedex.com/social-responsibility/csr-policy-statements/.

This statement is signed on behalf of FedEx by Trevor Hoyle, Senior Vice President for FedEx Express & TNT on 5^th November 2020.