Ecommerce companies have come up with an interesting solution to tackle the challenges of last-mile delivery. One of the biggest challenges that courier employees face when going out to deliver goods, is that if a customer is not immediately available to accept the product, they have to continuously visit the customer’s home till the product can get delivered. After a few days though, the order automatically gets cancelled and the product gets returned to the seller. Since there is no physical point where these products can be picked up by the customer if a product delivery is missed, it becomes difficult to coordinate.
Online retailers are now planning to rope in small local shops and corner stores to help with last mile delivery. According to speculations, these will soon become pick-up and drop-off points for online product deliveries.
India Post is also offering its locations as part of this ecommerce plan. It had already tied up with Snapdeal and ShopClues six months ago. Despite about 90% of the department’s more than 1.5 lakh post offices being in the rural areas, Sandeep Ladda, leader (technology) at PricewaterhouseCoopers explains where India Post lacks, “Though India Post in unmatchable in terms of accuracy and penetration, e-commerce depends on quick turnaround and closure of transactions. This is where third-party logistics players stand to gain.”
DTDC Courier & Cargo plan to increase their reach through this method, by assigning small corner shops near to the customers as pick-up points for the products. This is explained by their executive Sanjiv Kathuria, “The problem of closed-doors in urban areas as well as reaching tier 3 and 4 cities for delivery can be solved through pick-up and drop-off points. Though our preference is for channel partners, we are working on tie-ups with convenience stores, medical shops where our network is not available.”
This concept has already been put into action by GoJavas, the erstwhile logistics arm of online retailer Jabong. This project is already being tried out across 39 locations. Vijay Ghadge, COO of GoJavas says, “The most important factor is to inform the customer as to how the product will be delivered. Kirana stores will be paid a set fee, details of which are yet to be decided.”
This is truly an innovative solution to the last mile delivery challenge!
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