Page 150 - Proceeding of Atrans Young Researcher's Forum 2019_Neat

“Transportation for A Better Life:
Smart Mobility for Now and Then”

23 August 2019, Bangkok, Thailand

operator. Recipients often request that deliveries customers’ needs. Routing algorithms can be used to
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take place on weekends or after business hours when plan more efficient pick up, drop off times and
they are home to avoid exposure of the package to delivery routes, optimizing speed of delivery. Alert
weather and potential theft . In the event of a failed systems can be set up to automatically inform
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delivery, the parcels are either left outside the house, merchants of the pickup time and customers of the
with neighbors or customers are required to retrieve arrival time. Tracking of the parcels can help ease
the parcel by themselves at the nearest post office. the minds of customers and promote full visibility.
This causes inconvenience for the consumers and With analytics, delivery companies are also able to
decreases delivery productivity of the delivery men, study their past data and predict future demands,
resulting in high delivery failure costs for delivery especially during peak periods, and plan
operators. accordingly. Other aspects that can be optimized
includes integrated inventory management, product
Customers are also discouraged from search and match, matching courier to delivery tasks,
buying certain products due to the long delivery pricing, dynamic routing, and more. 15
time. Based on the survey conducted by McKinsey,
consumers did not purchase products like groceries Due to the development uncertainties of
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and medications due to the long delivery time. autonomous delivery vehicles, delivery companies
Other products, like cooked food which can only be are looking at alternate last mile solutions. The use
delivered by delivery men also required consumers of consolidation collection points such as lockers is
to pay a high delivery cost and thus discourage one such method that is growing in popularity as a
consumers from opting for delivery as last mile solution. According to a 2017 IPC cross-
well. Delivery of cooked food also proves a border e-commerce shopper survey study, 11% of all
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challenge for restaurants. With orders coming from parcels are delivered to an automated parcel machine
both offline and online, it is difficult for restaurants (APM) and 9% of returned parcels pass through the
to prioritise and manage orders efficiently especially machines. Consolidated collection points enable
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during peak hours. For restaurants who engage and delivery recipients to collect, return and ship parcels
sell on third party delivery platforms, it is often hard at their convenience, greatly increasing the
to time the arrival of the delivery men and ensure flexibility of deliveries. As labour shortage and
supply. As a result, delivery men would crowd the operational costs grow, lockers are expected to play
restaurants while waiting for the orders to be ready. a more important role in the last mile industry. The
This disrupts operations and distracts the restaurant main advantage of consolidated collection points is
staff from servicing in-store customers. a reduction in the number of deliveries, including
missed deliveries and returns. The aggregation of
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Despite the challenges, delivery companies deliveries also reduces logistics costs, increase
that are able to overcome them would be able to delivery efficiency and generate new market
maintain their competitive advantage and stand opportunities.
above the competition. This is why many logistic
companies have turned to innovation, optimizing The national postal service of Singapore,
processes and digital transformation in order to meet SingPost has begun collaborating with different
customers’ demands while providing high quality partners in order to advance the last mile delivery
experience at affordable prices. industry. SingPost has installed over 160
POPStation parcel lockers across Singapore to offer
2.3 Alternative delivery methods customers greater flexibility. They are also working
One way delivery providers can reduce last on a pilot for the Locker Alliance, an open access
mile delivery time and improve responsiveness is by delivery network of 43 lockers in two suburbs,
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“augmenting their reliance for large warehouses”, Punggol and Bukit Panjang , which allows residents
opting instead for smaller sorting delivery hubs to receive and return parcels conveniently,
which are located closer to their customers. regardless of which logistics firm handles the
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Another way is to optimize aspects of their delivery. The partner of the locker alliance,
operations by using advanced algorithms and Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA),
analytics. Optimization algorithms are able to help estimates that once fully implemented, “logistics
merchants select the most optimal shipping method service providers can potentially see a 50 percent
based on multiple criteria to best meet the reduction in distance traveled by drivers and a five-

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