Specified-day delivery services hit record high in May
UK online retail parcel delivery order volumes were up 14.8% year-on-year in May, fuelled by the royal wedding and hot weather, according to the IMRG MetaPack UK Delivery Index.
Also last month, the use of next-day/specified-day services hit a record high for this time of the year – at 37% of UK-delivered orders. However, this trend, combined with strong volume growth, is likely to be a chief cause of a drop in on-time delivery performance, which reached its lowest May level in the history of the Index (88%). This is also the first time the percentage of deliveries arriving on-time has dipped beneath 90% in May.
“IMRG have carried out shopper surveys every year for the past nine years and what’s interesting about the move toward faster fulfilment is that customers haven’t really been asking for it – these studies have consistently found that two days is still perfectly acceptable,” says Andy Mulcahy, Strategy and Insight Director, IMRG.”
“As technology and processes have evolved, however, industry has come to view it as a potential differentiator in acquiring and retaining customers and their expectations are changing in line with that over time. A lingering question is whether they always know they are getting next-day; some orders are sent on premium services because customers require it and are prepared to pay for them, but many are not requested. How many ‘genuine’ next-day deliveries fail and how many orders are being delivered next-day when the customer does not actually expect them?”