Giving Back
Whether it’s reducing our environmental impact, helping less-developed overseas communities or encouraging equal opportunities, social responsibility always remains a priority.
Charity Support
Our adopted charities are a very important part of DX. This year we are delighted to work in partnership with 3 charities; Action Medical Research, Battle Batten and CLIC Sargent.
We provide support alongside other fundraisers; funds for the charity are raised through events, donations, merchandising and corporate sponsorships. We encourage employees to think of creative and fun ways to raise as much money as possible. On top of this, DX has pledged to match the money raised, up to £50,000 and all money raised will be equally divided between the 3 charities;
- Action Medical Research raises vital funds to support medical research, aiming to beat the diseases that devastate the lives of so many of our children.
- The parents of Freddie & Louie launched the Battle Batten campaign to raise funds for research into the cruel CLN5 Batten Disease, devastating their twin boys’ lives, for which there is currently no cure.
- The largest of the three chosen charities, CLIC Sargent, provides vital support to young cancer patients and their families, taking their knowledge and experience to service providers and policy makers, to help change things for the better.
Hire a Hero
Hire a Hero is a charity that supports service leavers through the transition into civilian life. We work in partnership with public, private and third sector organisations to provide a network of support and to signpost service leavers to the most appropriate resources as required. For many service leavers civilian life can be a confusing, chaotic place; the charity, through its network of businesses, mentors and volunteers provides a consistent source of support to service leavers. Essential to the Hire a Hero way of working is the individualised support provided and the connection maintained through the transition period. Hire a Hero helps service leavers to make better informed choices as well connecting them with businesses for potential employment
We wanted to work with Hire a Hero as part of our overall strategy to promote us as an armed forces friendly employer. DX is actively working with the charity to provide both working interview placements as well as meaningful employment opportunities for service leavers. We are working with Hire a Hero to identify and embrace transferable skills of service leavers to support the transition from military to civilian life.
Vision Aid Overseas
For over 15 years we’ve worked with Vision Aid Oversees (‘VAO’), a charity helping adults and children in developing countries gain access to eye care and spectacles. DX has delivered over 25 million pairs of glasses to VAO, now at a rate of more than 3 million per year. We estimate that the value of this service is £50,000 a year. The recycle value for VAO is roughly £200,000 a year (amounting to over £2 million since the start of our relationship with them); this is the equivalent of a fifth of VAO’s total revenue. DX also delivers fundraising and promotional material throughout the country free of charge.
Committed to our Colleagues
DX employs a culturally diverse workforce wherever it operates; one that’s truly representative of the local population. We recruit on ability and continue to experience high levels of colleague satisfaction and retention. This is reinforced and improved through the development of our Code of Ethics and Business Practices.
Committed to the Environment
DX continues to focus strongly on reducing the effects our business has on the environment. We set a target in 2012 of 5% reduction over all areas of Environmental management. We are proud to report we have exceeded these savings over the past 12 months.
Diesel fuel emissions – have reduced from 587 Kg CO2e to 421 Kg CO2e. This has been achieved through a number of measures ranging from optimising our routing to reductions in meetings and a move to conference and video calling.
Estates management programme – over the past 3 years we have had a programme of co-locating sites resulting in reduced fuel costs and CO2 emissions through the alignment of delivery and collection routes and a reduction in the number of operating sites. Where appropriate all future buildings will be fitted with LED lighting and zoned heating; this will reduce the energy usage as will be evident from the installation of half hourly zoned electricity metres. The half hourly meters will enable us to measure usage accurately and plan for future energy saving initiatives.
Energy management – we have contracted the services of a major buildings maintenance and energy management company, MITIE Asset Management. A comprehensive review of energy suppliers has been completed by Utilyx (a subsidiary of MITIE) which has enabled savings in energy use by comparing major energy suppliers’ tariffs. With Utilyx we will identify new energy solutions that allow us to reduce energy costs, improve energy security and shrink our environmental footprint
Customers – our aim is to eradicate paper from our ordering process. Our online ordering tool DX Despatch , an electronic means of providing us with freight collection manifests. If our customers cannot move to our online service a surcharge is levied to cover the cost of supply and to encourage a move away from the environmentally unfriendly paper alternative. Waste management –We continue to act diligently in reducing our waste and ensuring where possible packaging used by ourselves and our customers is recyclable. Reduction of waste to landfill – the safe disposal of waste limits the volumes sent to landfill. Currently 83% of our waste is recycled and 5% is converted to energy. Our new DX Secure Shredding service ensures that we now have an inhouse option to collect shred and recycle our customer secure paper waste.
The office environment – we continue to implement new approaches to reducing the environment impact in our offices. We have introduced printer management systems in all offices that facilitate document scanning which reduces paper and energy use.
DX hosts its infrastructure in a Carbon Neutral facility, which has recently been awarded a Carbon Neutral status. We’ve achieved this through our environmental strategy:
- Limiting our waste and energy consumption wherever possible
- Encouraging the recycling of paper, cardboard and plastic cups across our sites
- Regularly maintaining our small vehicle fleet
- Recycling & reusing of packaging used to send specialist items (Tracked Specimens)
Committed to Continued Improvement
Not one to rest on our laurels, we always aim to better ourselves and to help those who need it the most, while limiting our consumption and impact on the environment.
Committed to a socially responsible supply chain
DX requires all suppliers to adhere to its Supplier Code of Conduct which reinforces DX’s values throughout its supply chains.
