Derek Osborn walks us through the advantages and disadvantages of carrier-owned postal delivery routes. He concludes that more testing and experimentation is required in this area.

1. Carrier
Owned
Delivery
Routes
Derek Osborn
Whatnext4u
17.10.13

2. Facilitator: Derek Osborn
Director Whatnext4u
International postal business coach
Previously - 22 years in management roles in RM

3. Derek Osborn
Last 12 years I have worked with the
 Vision and strategy
postal industry around the world as a
International Postal Business Coach
Whatnext4u
 The future of post
business coach – often to:
 Fostering innovation
Research postal topics and to lead,
 Thinking differently
design and facilitate workshops, and
deliver management training, seminars,  Customer centricity
forums and master classes on:
 Engaging customers
 Delivery operations
 Operational
improvement
 Human resource
development
 Leading change,
modernisation and
transformation
 Reinventing the post

5. Reinventing the Post published and
launched 2 weeks ago at Post Expo
Section 2 is entitled Reinventing Delivery and
the Last Mile

6. Webinar Programme
• Background and context
• Advantages and disadvantages of carrierowned routes
• Operational, quality and customer issues –
and opportunities
• Is ‘final mile consolidation’ a sensible way
forward in a liberalised market?
• Final thoughts

7. So what is the context and what are
the challenges in postal delivery?

8. Some GENERAL trends
From
• ‘Information poor’
• Different suppliers of
products and services from
different places
• You get what they decide to
give you and when
• Fixed channels - shops,
telephone and catalogues
• Then you had to work hard to
get what you want
To
• ‘Information rich’
• Everything (products and
services) available in one
place - integrated
• You choose – eg options and
‘comparison’ sites
• Streamed on-line via
broadband internet
• Now you control and decide
what you want and when
and how

9. MORE TRENDS
From
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Fixed
Hard-wired
Land-lined
Physical
Hardware dependent
Inflexible
At given times
Customer has to use
different channels
To
• Location independent
• Hand-held
• Cordless
• Virtual
• Cloud-based
• Very flexible
• 24/7 on demand
• Integrated to customer via
one channel

10. Major postal trends
From
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Volume
2 D (letters)
Sender
Push
Physical
End to end quality
Monopoly providers
Single, separate businesses
• Product/service focus
To
• Value
• 3 D (packets and parcels)
• Receiver (and sender)
• Pull
• Integrated physical/digital
• Precision delivery quality
• Open competitive market
• Different business
configurations
• Customer needs focus

11. Postal industry balance sheet
Glass ‘half-empty’
•
•
•
•
•
•
Declining volumes
Electronic substitution
Environmental concerns
Greater competition
Greater regulation
More demanding
customers
Glass ‘half-full’
• Trust and Brand
• Ubiquity – everywhere
• Universal service
• Delivery capability
• Address knowledge
• Value of mail
• Integrating physical and
digital solutions
• Global connectivity
• Agency for Governments
• Committed employees

12. Postal industry leveraging assets
Glass ‘half-full’
Accentuating the Positive
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
• Recognisable and secure access
Wide/easy access to services
• Biggest customer database
• Everything ‘to the door’
• Granular knowledge of locations
• The personal ‘Mail Moment’
• Uniquely connecting physical and
electronic – hybrid options
• Global connections if needed
• E-government applications
• Experience, ideas and resources
Trust and Brand
Ubiquity – everywhere
Universal service
Delivery capability
Address knowledge
Value of mail
Integrating physical and digital
solutions
• Global connectivity
• Agency for Governments
• Committed employees

13. Leveraging your assets

14. Which brings us to delivery….
Senders
Receivers
• Posts used to focus on senders but now there is as much, if
not more, focus on recipients
• Delivery customers are becoming critical in determining the
carriers and the service
• For postal operators, delivery remains, perhaps more than
ever, their “core business”
• It is where you can differentiate yourself from the
competitors
• BUT it is also costly, with fluctuating workload and the out
door element is hard to supervise or manage

15. Advantages
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Ownership
Level of effort
Commitment to customers
Customer engagement and
customer service
Efficiency
Fixed costs
Quality
Leave cover
Less overheads
Contracts

16. Disadvantages
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Ownership
Level of effort
Commitment to customers
Customer engagement and
customer service
Efficiency
Fixed costs
Quality
Leave cover
Less overheads
Contracts

17. Operational issues and opportunities
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Optimising - discretion over route
Flexibility with volumes, exceptional situations
Weather conditions - adaptable timing
Self-regulated - less need for supervision
Standards and efficiency – can be exceeded
Local knowledge and consistency
Investment and equipment – can leapfrog
Work-rate and effort – self-motivation

18. Quality issues
• Not in total control – but can go extra mile
• Can blame others – but totally accountable
• Knows what customers want – meets their
individual needs
• Maybe unable to satisfy all customers – but
can work out the best compromise
• Will ‘feel’ poor quality of service directly incentive to improve and deliver quality

19. Customer issues
• Can fall out with individual customers – but
knows customers and can build good
relationships
• Maybe split loyalty and does more ‘own’
business – but works interactively with
customers to deliver what they need
• Feels remote from company but can drive
personal service and attention

20. Final Mile Consolidation?
Reasons why it could make sense
• ATM’s
• Mobile network wireless
masts
• Environmental – emissions
• All the above – better
efficiency, quality, customer
service and relationships
• Liberalised market to avoid
confusion and duplication
of effort, cost etc
Challenges to overcome
• Trust
• Compatibility of systems –
eg track and trace
• Contract management
• Pricing
• Quality assurance
• Ownership of customers
• Brand loyalty

21. • Advantages and disadvantages
• Not been extensively tried
• Could be explored a bit more

22. Questions?
I’m happy to discuss
further with anyone

23. Thank you for your participation
derekosborn@whatnext4u.com
23

24. Reinventing the Post continues
18–20th Nov 2013
Bangkok
25–27th Feb 2014
Durban
20–21st May 2014
3–5th June 2014
10-12th June 2014
9th Sept 2014
Hong Kong Post Expo Asia-Pacific 2014
Oslo – E-BISS International Delivery Benchmarking
Workshop
Gibraltar – Small Posts and Islands Postal Forum
Canada – America-Pacific Benchmarking Workshop

25. Whatnext4u in the postal industry:
workshops, facilitation, research and training
Postal industry and strategy
Understanding the global postal industry
Good practice, benchmarking ideas and
knowledge sharing
Research into innovation and ideas for
promoting the value of mail
Innovative strategy thinking - developing
an effective business vision, mission and
strategy. Strategy and business plans –
make it happen
People, innovation and change
Developing a motivated workforce
Managing change effectively
Fostering innovation - turn problems into
opportunities. Embedding innovation
and implementing good ideas
Engaging employees/ improving internal
communications
Customers, quality and markets
Growing mail volumes by understanding
your markets and engaging your customers
Developing account management for key
customers, building customer relationships
Creating a customer-focused culture in the
organisation
Building a quality organisation on business
excellence and improving service quality
Postal operations
Improving operational efficiency and
deploying best practice in postal delivery
Recipient based delivery solutions
Embracing new technologies
Reviewing your operation through facilitated
self-assessment
Internal benchmarking for performance
improvement