Every day, we encounter at least 1 report/question about an undelivered package on thematic forums. It’s annoying, because you not only lose the shipping cost in such a case, but it can also easily result in administrative and logistical costs for you.
If you want to take steps to reduce the rate of undelivered packages, you must first understand the reasons for this phenomenon in the first place:
From the customer’s side
It is a problem, for example, if he is not at home at the time of delivery and does not notify the courier. It is also common if he does not have enough cash and therefore does not accept the ordered goods.
Unfortunately, it also happens more and more often when the customer orders the given product from several places and receives the one that arrives the fastest, or if the delivery time is slow, he goes to a store for the chosen product and does not accept the previous order from the courier.
From the courier companies
There can be many reasons why a courier service delivers more slowly, or the package gets mixed up, which it then does not inform you about in time.
A common problem is when the courier does not immediately notify the customer of the expected delivery time, so he may not be able to arrange the collection because, for example, everyone has already left home, or the courier gives information on time, but does not stick to it later.
So what should we do if we want to avoid the inconvenience caused by undelivered packages?
1. Speed up delivery as much as possible
This is how you can have the biggest impact on increasing the acceptance rate. Of course, the most ideal solution is if the prepared package can be handed over to the courier company on the day of the order.
If possible, work from stock and do not allow the ordering of products from your online store that are not in stock at a given moment, as their procurement time also increases the time allotted for delivery.
2. Keep in constant contact with your customer
In general, continuous and informative communication is essential to increase customer satisfaction. It is important to inform your customer immediately about every step of the order. This is especially important if you cannot guarantee next-day delivery, because it unfortunately happens that they order the same product from another place over the course of several days and accept the one that arrives sooner.
3. Choose a reliable courier service
It is by no means profitable to accept an offer from a courier company that offers lower prices but works with a higher error rate. After taking into account the additional costs incurred due to unclaimed packages, it becomes easy to see that it is better to immediately choose the more expensive but reliable courier company.
4. Increase the number of orders paid online
In Hungary, even now, a significant proportion of online orders are settled by cash on delivery. If for the time being you feel that the decision to simply remove the cash on delivery option is drastic, but you would still like to direct your customers towards online payment solutions, you can also make the option of cash on delivery less favorable than online payment by charging extra costs.
