"The appetite for access to real-time data is growing in both the B2B and the B2C markets. The B2B sector remains very important to us, but the weakening economy has shifted consumer buying habits.

So we have worked with Blackbay to develop new B2C solutions to meet a demand from our customers for services which provide business benefits at the doorstep, and the demand for more flexible delivery options from consumers," explained Brendan O’Neill, DPD Ireland's CEO.

Using Blackbay's new Survey Module, DPD will be the first parcel delivery provider to enable its drivers to carry out real-time customised questionnaires with consumers at the doorstep. 

"The real-time data captured as consumers take delivery of their goods, will help e-retailers improve their customer service by checking whether drivers have complied with specific delivery instructions, such as delivering goods to a designated 'safe place' or that all the components of the goods ordered have been delivered," added O'Neill. "Any discrepancies are passed back to the e-retailer who is then able to deal with them immediately."

The ability to check delivery compliance plays a key role in helping DPD overcome the biggest challenge to both the carrier and e-retailer – the last mile. The transfer of data between the e-retailer and the carrier ensures that individual drivers have full visibility of consumers' intentions regarding delivery when placing their orders.

"Complying with consumers' delivery requirements at all levels helps us meet our key objective of delivering first time, right time, every time," said O'Neill. "Blackbay's solution has enabled DPD to achieve a 98.6% delivery success rate, which is considerably higher than the industry average. Our aim is to improve this."

The Survey module will help e-retailers increase revenue through up-sell and cross-selling opportunities. The Survey module is triggered by the delivery scan and a questionnaire will then prompt the driver to ask the consumer questions relating to additional services or product offerings for the product delivered. If the consumer is interested then the data collected by the driver is automatically sent to the e-retailer and a 'warm lead' call can be made almost immediately.

"One of our customers estimates that a 60% conversion rate is possible for warm lead opportunities which are identified during a doorstep delivery and followed up within an hour," continued O'Neill. "This statistic perfectly highlights the power of Blackbay's Survey module and the benefits it can deliver to our customers."

DPD has been deploying Blackbay's enterprise mobility solution for the last three years and has recently extended its contract for another five until 2016. Blackbay's solution has already allowed DPD to increase market share by increasing volume by 19% since 2009, despite the fragile state of the Irish economy.

"We have been able to make operational and driver efficiencies which in turn has enabled DPD to make our own business more cost efficient," said O'Neill. "We continue to offer very price competitive services which have filtered back down to our customers, benefitting the entire supply chain.”

Blackbay's latest software release will enable DPD to build on the concrete business benefits already delivered by further streamlining its business processes, and allowing DPD to provide the highest level of customer service by positioning themselves as an extension to their customers’ business at the doorstep.

"We made the decision to renew our contract with Blackbay as the foundations of the initial deployment were extremely strong. Blackbay's team has extensive knowledge and expertise in the parcel delivery marketplace and always brings positive ideas to the table. Its technology has become fundamentally essential to how we deliver quality of service to our customers and importantly, to their customers," stated O'Neill.

"The strong partnership between Blackbay and DPD is a great illustration of how companies can, and should, work together to achieve a successful enterprise mobility deployment that is versatile enough to exactly meet, not only the customer's needs but the demands of its customers," added Nigel Doust, Blackbay's CEO.

Looking to the future, DPD will be working with Blackbay to aggressively expand its B2B and B2C products and service offerings. There will be a particular focus on enhancing the service around the handling of returns as DPD sees a gap in this sector of the marketplace.

"We will work to provide services that deliver more relevant and time sensitive information to customers and consumers. The access to real-time data is the linchpin that holds first time, right time, every time deliveries together," concluded O'Neill.

About DPD Ireland

Interlink Ireland Ltd was founded in 1986 with 10 depots. Following substantial growth, it is now the premier parcel delivery company in Ireland, with 38 depots handling in excess of 6 million parcels per year. In 2000, Interlink Ireland became part of GeoPost S.A. the parcels and express division of La Poste, the French Post Office. In February 2008, Interlink Ireland changed its name to DPD. Its parent company, La Poste, united its express parcel companies under one single brand - DPD - to provide its customers with one united delivery partner throughout Europe and beyond. 

For more information visit www.dpd.ie

"The decision to extend our UK, European and Asia Pacific operations into North America, initially within our key business sectors of Field Service and Supply Chain, was driven by our understanding of the importance of meeting the increasing requirement for our mobility solutions with a local presence," said Larry Klimczyk, CEO, Blackbay. "Additionally, Blackbay has a strong financial position which enables us to grasp this growth opportunity firmly with both hands."

Growing Reputation as Market Leader

"The North American interest in our products is a direct result of Blackbay's growing reputation as a leading global provider of robust enterprise mobility solutions that provide real-time visibility of information to and from the field. This delivers a competitive advantage in lowering costs and improving service," continued Klimczyk.

Interest in Blackbay is also driven by its ability to provide a SaaS offering, which enables its products to easily integrate with additional applications such as remote device management, satellite navigation, telematics, route and job scheduling etc.

The features and functionality of Blackbay's solutions are only one of the reasons why it has a proven track record of delivering enterprise solutions to blue chip organisations such as DHL, Royal Mail, Hermes, Dyson, and National Road and Motorists Association (NRMA). What differentiates Blackbay from its perceived competitors is how it has used its extensive industry knowledge and expertise to deliver robust highly scalable solutions.

"Blackbay has tailored its project management methodologies to exactly meet the unique requirements of individual enterprise mobility solutions. Our methodologies, combined with Blackbay's collaborative approach with our customers' project teams, allow us to ensure that we are able to help our customers to meet the objectives of their mobility solution as quickly and easily as possible," explained Klimczyk.

Improved Marketplace for Enterprise Mobility

2009 was a turbulent year for the global economy but there are clear signs that worldwide markets are on the road to recovery. Aberdeen's latest field service survey(i) backs up Blackbay's view that 2010 is set to deliver an improved marketplace for enterprise mobility solution providers. It shows there is an increasing trend towards the deployment of customised solutions rather than mobility development platforms, which often require a higher initial outlay of capital.

"There is a significant amount of interest in the deployment of mobile solutions across the enterprise field service market and our recent research shows that Best-in-Class companies are more than two times as likely to have mobile field service applications in place," states Sumair Dutta, Senior Research Analyst at the Aberdeen Group. "In response to cost, customer satisfaction and productivity pressures, service organisations are not only looking to become more mobile with regards to the purchase of mobile tools, but also with the workflows and processes that can be enabled in the field on a mobile device. Solutions, such as the on-demand offering provided by Blackbay, present evaluating service organisations with an incredible opportunity to empower their field workers and drive needed improvements to productivity and profitability."

Crucially, Blackbay has strong relationships with leading rugged mobile device hardware manufacturers.

"Working closely with Blackbay we are able to ensure that its software integrates with our hardware to deliver proven feature rich solutions that meet the unique mobility needs of our customers. Our continuing relationship with Blackbay has helped us to gain additional market share and will help us to meet the increasing need for mobility solutions across all sectors in the North American marketplace," added Patrick J. Byrne, Intermec President and CEO.

"Blackbay has worked closely with leading market analysts and believes that its SaaS model, combined with the strength of its managed services, available from as little as US$1 per user per day, can help North American companies to invest in enterprise mobility technologies that will deliver significant return on investment," concluded Klimczyk.

(i)Aberdeen Group Field Service Survey June 2009 - Sumair Dutta, Senior Research Analyst

Post Expo is universally recognised as the world’s leading annual event for the international postal, express and mailing industry.

Blackbay will be exhibiting with Motorola Solutions and Zebra (Stand 5014) and will  feature solutions designed to provide the ultimate doorstep experience, increase efficiency, improve customer service and drive revenues. 

Blackbay currently has over 50,000 postal workers using Blackbay solutions  to manage over 3,000,000 deliveries per day.

Event Details:

27, 28, 29, September 2011
Stuttgart Messe, Stuttgart
Booth #: 5014
http://www.postexpo.com/index.php

 

Hermes is the UK's largest delivery network, handling over 115 million collections and deliveries each year. It offers its customers, which include household names: Lakeland Limited, LandsEnd, Next Directory, QVC, sit-up channels and Store Twenty One, a dedicated business to consumer residential delivery solution, specifically designed to meet the demands of the UK and European retail, mail order and online shopping markets.

Hermes operates a network of over 7,500 lifestyle couriers who operate in close proximity to their homes, enabling them to offer a high quality door-step delivery, combined with a friendly and local approach.

Over the past several years Hermes has been experiencing considerable growth, with expansion into European delivery, and the consumer to consumer market through myhermes.co.uk, which offers a door to door parcel delivery service, ideal for consumers who would like to save time and money on their shipping costs.

With a growing number of customers demanding timely and accurate information on deliveries and collections, Hermes realised that it needed to replace its existing paper based delivery system with an enterprise mobility solution which would provide real-time visibility both of its couriers and the status of deliveries and collections. In order to ensure that its customers could access this data quickly and easily it needed to be available on the Hermes website.

"We realised that the existing paper-based system was not providing us with the information our customers were demanding," explained Mike Leyland, Hermes' IT Director. "Waiting for paper based records of collections and deliveries to be returned to local depots and then manually input into our back office systems could be a lengthy process, and was prone to human error from illegible hand writing. We could not track and trace parcels during the actual collection or delivery process which made it difficult to provide accurate confirmation of collections and deliveries to our customers."

Download the full case study from the Knowledge Centre.

"One reason as to why consumers are not being sent real-time updates on the progress of their deliveries, is centred around who 'owns' the data captured during the delivery process," explained Nigel Doust. CEO of Blackbay, supporters of this and the 2011 IMRG Review. "Is it the carrier who is responsible for ensuring deliveries are made on time or is it the e-retailer, who has the expertise in communicating with its customers and delivering quality of service?"

This conundrum will not be quickly resolved, but both parties need to give it their full attention especially as 77% of respondents to the IMRG Review, stated that their delivery experience is influential in positively affecting further purchasing decisions.

"With in excess of 1bn parcels being shipped from online purchases in the UK each year, it is astounding that carrier companies are not using technology, available today, to eliminate consumers' fears around home delivery," added Doust. "Today's enterprise mobility solutions capture the information consumers are demanding, but not all carriers are utilising it and making it available to e-retailers so that they can pass it to their customers."

The UK is Europe's leading e-retail economy with sales estimated to have reached £68.2bn in 2011 which, despite the recession, represents an annual growth level of 16%. For 2012, the UK market is forecast to grow a further 13%. "The UK's online spend per shopper per annum is £1,850, so e-retailers and their carriers are in danger of missing out on this ever growing revenue opportunity if they are not providing a good delivery experience," Doust continued.

Interestingly, this 4^th Annual Review, shows that the main concern for consumers is ensuring that they are at home and available to accept a delivery. Consumers are looking for the ability to specify a delivery time slot so that they receive their goods when they expect with no delay i.e. first-time, on-time delivery.

To help achieve first-time on-time delivery, consumers want consistent communication from the e-retailer and/or carrier throughout the delivery process as to the status of the delivery. Specific delivery instructions, dictated by the consumer at the time of placing the online order, must be followed by the delivery driver.

Blackbay's enterprise mobility solutions already track every event in the delivery process. The captured data can be passed to consumers ensuring they receive the proactive communication they want providing the status of their goods and expected delivery time.

“Up to date market research around the Home Delivery market place, like that supported by Blackbay, plays a key role in helping us keep abreast of what consumers want and helps identify where

e-retailers and their carriers need to work harder to meet those demands. Consumers’ expectations are driven by their experience of the wider digital world and e-retailers and carriers need to deploy the right technology solutions to make sure that they keep pace," said Andrew Starkey, Head of e-Logistics at IMRG

"Consumers are not necessarily demanding lots of delivery choices. They are simply looking for reassurance that when they select a specific delivery option, it will be met and that their home delivery will be made first-time, on-time. Blackbay can help e-retailers and carriers achieve this, right now." concluded Doust.

NB: All stats sourced from IMRG

About IMRG
IMRG (Interactive Media In Retail Group) is the UK’s industry association for e-retail. Formed in 1990, IMRG is setting and maintaining pragmatic and robust e-Retail Standards to enable fast-track industry growth, and facilitates its community of members with practical help, information, tools, guidance and networking. Consumers can be confident when dealing with IMRG Members because all have committed to operate using methods that are Honest, Decent, Legal, Truthful and Fair, and have undertaken to not bring the industry into disrepute. The strength of IMRG is the collective and co-operative power of its members. For more information please visit http://www.imrg.org/ or email  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

The report, sponsored and structured by Blackbay, found that:

The failed delivery experience varied hugely:

• Of 13 orders sent to a flat with no-one home, 3 were left with a neighbour not known to the customer, with no card left to explain where the goods were
• 5 orders were left outside the flat door
• 2 drivers left cards for the deliveries to be rearranged
• 1 driver left a phone message and tried to redeliver next day
• 2 orders were shoved through the letterbox

Pre-delivery, some retailers stated who would deliver the goods; others did not:

• Pre-order, 41% of the retailers tested told the customer which carrier would be delivering their goods
• 99.9% sent an order confirmation e-mail but only 6% mentioned the carrier
• 81% of retailers sent a despatch e-mail; only 41% mentioned the carrier
• 11% of the retailers sent pre-delivery text messages, up from 4% last year
• Text message content varied – some allowed rescheduling but most did not

64% of retailers provided access to detailed order tracking:

• 89% of retailers offered some order tracking to the customer, even if basic
• 64% provided detailed carrier tracking
• 69% of those with detailed tracking sent the customer to the carrier site
• None of the carrier tracking webpages mentioned the retailer’s name

On the doorstep:

• Only one of the drivers followed our special delivery instructions
• 27% of the drivers were described as ‘rude’ or ‘very rude’
• 137 orders (57%) required electronic proof of delivery, up from 50% last year
• 36% of the retailers that collected electronic proof of delivery did not surface that tracking information to the customer

Speed & timeliness:

• 81% of the retailers that gave us a timeframe delivered on time
• Deliveries were more likely to be on time if electronic POD was collected

Nigel Doust, CEO at Blackbay, said; “This year’s Doorstep Experience Report is once again a mixture of the sobering and the positive. On the one hand we see improvements in online order tracking but pre-delivery text interaction has only increased to 11%, providing a significant opportunity for the industry to improve first time delivery rates.”

“However, the failed delivery experience still leaves a lot to be desired. A quarter of the failed orders were left with a neighbour not known to the customer, with no card to explain what had happened. We still have work to do to make this process as simple, secure and successful as possible for the customer, the retailer, and the carrier.”

Carlo Rimini, Business Unit Director for E-commerce at MICROS UK said; “Our annual Online Retail Delivery Report always shows progress and improvements in how retailers are handling the delivery of online orders. Thanks to Blackbay we’ve been able to produce this extra report looking at what actually happens on the doorstep.”

“Some of the findings are disappointing; the failed delivery experience is still highly unpredictable, many retailers are still not offering detailed order tracking to the customer, and a quarter of the drivers that delivered our orders were described as ‘rude’. However, we believe that carriers and retailers are committed to resolving these issues and we expect to see improvements next year.”

The 2012 Home Delivery: The Doorstep Experience report, sponsored by Blackbay, is available free of charge at 

http://www.blackbay.com/images/Brochures/Brochure-articles/blackbay_homedeliveryuk_doorstepexperience.pdf

The report, Home Delivery in the UK – The Doorstep Experience, sponsored by Blackbay, a provider of real-time enterprise mobility solutions enabling service and productivity improvements to postal, field service and supply chain operations, shows that consumers still have cause for concern about whether goods will be delivered 1st time, on time and to the right place. Of specific concern is what happens to a parcel if no-one is at home to receive it.

“The last mile and doorstep experience is the most critical part of the online shopping experience and is often the only part of the process where there is any human interaction,” explained Nigel Doust, Blackbay’s CEO. “The performance of the delivery company during this vital stage is inextricably linked to the e-retailer and can play a key role in the consumer’s decision to purchase online again.”

“To ensure that the consumer receives a first class experience, e-retailers and their delivery companies must improve the level of communication with consumers,” commented Sarah Clelland, Marketing Manager, Snow Valley. “Individual parcels need to be tracked through every part of the collection and delivery process. The data captured can be communicated in real-time to the e-retailer, the delivery company and most importantly the consumer.”

Surprisingly, the Home Delivery report shows that only 57% of e-retailers gave their customers access to their delivery company’s tracking information.

“A customer who has purchased online goods from an e-retailer deploying an enterprise mobility solution, can at any given time check the delivery or collection, status of their goods. They always know where their parcel is,” added Doust.

A further 95% of retailers did not provide any kind of pre-delivery text alert to customers giving an expected time delivery slot.

“This simple communication with customers helps to improve their perception of the service they are receiving. Blackbay’s enterprise mobility solutions can be tailored to deliver this option and also allows the delivery agent to offer the option to change the delivery time,” commented Doust.

The Home Delivery report highlights the lack of predictability that consumers are experiencing if they are not at home to accept delivery. There is a lack of uniformity around ‘carded’ deliveries and delivery agents need to understand exactly what they should do in this scenario and how their actions can be communicated to the consumer.

“We placed extra orders during our delivery research this year so we could see what happened when the customer was not at home to receive them. We were really surprised that the experience was so different on each delivery – for a customer it feels as if there is no way of knowing what the driver will do if you aren’t at home,” said Clelland.

Again, Blackbay’s enterprise mobility solutions can be tailored to meet best practice requirements for failed delivery for example, the delivery agent can check if the customer has designated a ‘safe place’ for the goods to be left, and if this is the case the delivery agent can SMS the customer confirming this action has been carried out.

“In order to keep pace with the growing demand for online deliveries, e-retailers must be thinking about how best to retain their existing customers and win new ones. Being able to tell customers that they will always know where their parcels are and when and where they will be delivered is a key differentiator. It’s all about communication. Enterprise mobility solutions enable that communication,” concluded Doust.

To download a copy of the report click here

London, 13 April 2010 - Capita Business Services run the majority of the administration and collection of TV Licensing, including the field force of Enquiry Officers.  Capita has completed a project working with Global IT Service Provider CSC to deploy Blackbay’s Service Connect mobile worker software as a key component of an enterprise mobility solution to enhance the service it delivers to the BBC.  The mobile data capture technology has also enabled Capita to benefit from tangible return on investment (ROI), including the elimination of one tonne of paper per week from its operation.

“Deployment of Service Connect, which runs on Motorola MC70 hand held computers, has led to Capita’s TV Licensing field operations staff increasing the number of visits they are able to complete in a day, to both private and commercial premises resulting in an increase in licence fees being collected.  Our operations staff have less paperwork to deal with which has in turn significantly reduced time spent on administrative tasks by the field officers,” commented Colin Jones, Capita’s TV Licensing Field Operations Director.  “Our staff quickly accepted the mobile data capture solution, which has, as far as possible, replaced our paper based systems.  Many have said that they wouldn’t want to return to the old paper process.”

With over 1,200 employees working on the contract Capita’s role includes processing queries, applications and payments and maintaining an accurate licence database which identifies those addresses which are unlicensed.  Capita’s TV Licensing field force of enquiry officers are expecting to complete circa 4 million visits to unlicensed premises this financial year.

“Capita wanted the mobility solution to deliver real-time visibility of its field operations staff, cut the high level of manual processes they had to carry out, replace the existing paper based system to help improve staff self efficiency, increase manager efficiency and reduce back office workload and costs” stated Larry Klimczyk, CEO, Blackbay.

Paper Based Systems Out, Mobility Solution In.

Capita’s paper based system has been replaced with work schedules being sent electronically to its field staff rather than being posted.  The schedules include all relevant details of the individual or premises to be visited including past visit history.  Previously records of field activity would not be available for up to 4 weeks.  These are now available in minutes.  Visit results and timesheet data are now automatically sent from the MC70 to Capita’s back office systems instead of being recorded manually and put in the post.

“CSC, who are leading the overall project to deliver a complete enterprise mobility solution to us, working with Blackbay and Motorola have clearly met our objectives on this project” explained Jones.

“It was necessary for Blackbay and Motorola to develop an innovative solution to meet Capita’s TV Licensing unique requirements, to meet the needs of the complexity of its business processes and the volume of data to be captured from circa 4 million visits this year.  The ability to collect this much data, store it and then access it on the MC70 was a unique challenge.  Our long standing partnership with Blackbay enabled us to draw on the experiences of our strong customer base already deploying our integrated solution,” said Eamon Lyons, Account Executive at CSC.

Increase in Efficiency and Reduction in Cost.

The self sufficiency of Capita’s TV Licensing field staff has increased through the automatic removal of cancelled visits from their schedules and the ability to query the licence status of a property directly with the central database.

Manager efficiency has been increased through automated reporting for teams and officers and the real-time visibility of Capita’s TV Licensing field staff allows managers to balance work load by re-assigning visits as appropriate.

An 80% reduction in the number of calls to the support team to check address/licence enquiries has helped to cut back office workload and costs with less data input having to be carried out.  Previously the call centre was handling between 25,000 and 30,000 calls per month; this has now decreased to 4,000 to 5,000 calls per month.

“We can now produce reports around visits made and the resulting actions which have improved our ability to meet our service level agreements (SLA’s) with the BBC,” added Jones.

“From a financial perspective, the solution has had a positive impact on the cost of the field force.  The impact on the environment has been positive as the reduction of the usage of paper in the system has led to us eliminating the use of over one tonne of paper per week,” concluded Jones.

An enquiry from a reader of Service Management emphasised how field service suppliers are becoming more aware of the possibilities provided by technology and are increasingly discussing the advantages of integrating their service management systems with other solutions.

This question was passed to the industry’s suppliers and their response provides food for thought in a number of areas.Ian Evans, Astea International managing director, EMEA, said few would argue that integrating service management software with enterprise systems can deliver many benefits.

‘But while the big ERP players appear to provide integrated packages, these are often ‘one-size-fits-all’ and fall short of meeting organisations’ specific objectives,’ he said. ‘Solutions from niche SM vendors contain greater functionality and flexibility in accommodating current and future needs, but can be too specific to meet wider business objectives.’

Evans highlighted the trend for suppliers to collaborate with complementary vendors to create ‘pre-integrated’ solutions. ‘Technologies based on service orientated architecture (SOA), and standardisation of platforms has accelerated this shift, as software can now be integrated easier than ever before,’ he said.

The current shift in integration is two-fold, he summarised, with service management systems becoming easier to integrate through vendors undertaking the work involved. ‘Ultimately this means that an organisation now requires fewer integration points for each software implementation, thus freeing up resources to focus on strategy, driving efficiencies and maximising profitability,’ he said.

Mobile Direct Access

Clive Fearn, The Barcode Warehouse marketing director explained how enterprise mobility software companies have developed solutions that integrate directly into ERP systems, allowing mobile direct access to SAP stock records in the field.

‘When items were sold from vans and once the screen was signed, the stock in the vehicle was down dated, allowing the invoice for the items to be generated in the field,’ he said. Other areas include CRM data capture software running on mobile devices deployed by sales agents, Fearn continued. The agents capture information into electronic forms and the data is automatically transmitted to the back office system.

With deployments frequently carried out by enterprise mobility solution providers, service companies looking to integrate a similar system are able to establish if it had been integrated before and by whom. ‘This knowledge enables service companies to feel confident that a successful deployment is possible and can help to deliver significant ROI,’ said Fearn.

Integrated Service Management & Mobility

Larry Klimczyk, Blackbay chief executive officer stated that integration of mobility software solutions with service management systems, ERP or CRM systems is key to the successful deployment of enterprise mobility solutions providing access to obtain information from, and input data to them all.

Read the Full Article - http://www.servicemanagement365.com/Service_Management_Software/Article415185.aspx