Autumn 2007

Recognising the disquiet in the home delivery market created by the series of strikes at Royal Mail, Business Direct has ramped up the launch of its business-to-consumer drop-box delivery handling service.

Under this new system, which has been in gestation for several years and has been undergoing live trials in the UK during the summer, home delivery consignments can be dropped off in Business Direct's ParcelXchange network of intelligent box banks for collection by consumers. Currently the company says it has 4,000 such boxes at 300 locations in the UK.

Until now, deliveries to these boxes have been made by Business Direct's own carrier network, but it says that under this new system it is opening access to what it terms 'nationally-based post offices and logistics service providers around the world'.

The company says it has produced a range of cost-effective and sustainable solutions for last-mile deliveries, including B2C and consumer-to-consumer (C2C) deliveries, mail, failed deliveries, cash on delivery services and returns.

 

We understand that the technology on trial has included use of smartcards or credit cards by consumers to identify themselves and even make payments when collecting goods. Business Direct has been able to do this since it already uses elements of ATM technology in its box banks.

The company seems to be trying to avoid pushing the service purely as an alternative to post office deliveries. Indeed, it says that the system could actually help post offices 'retain clients that will come under attack from local intelligent box networks without the need to invest in the heavy development costs'.

There has been no response yet from ByBox (see separate story below), but this company, the closest rival to Business Direct in terms of technology and philosophy, is known to have been working on its own system for dealing with unattended consumer deliveries.