Postal Hub podcast

Marek Różycki and Dean Maciuba from Last Mile Experts join me to pore over some of the big delivery issues in 2020 and what lies ahead in 2021:

• Increased operating costs due to COVID countermeasures
• Residential delivery stops - drivers doing over 250 deliveries per day
• Amazon's own capacity for residential deliveries (USA)
• Training for delivery drivers
• B2B packages delivered to business addresses
• Creating capacity in the last mile and the availability of vehicles
• Are delivery companies worried about late deliveries?
• Throttling volumes (refusing volumes from customers)
• Technology (including interactive delivery management - IDM) and its importance to managing last mile capacity
• Incentives to customers to choose out-of-home delivery options, including PUDOs (access points)
• Residential delivery surcharges
• Will merchants pass on delivery savings to the consumer?
• Subscription models' reliance on out-of-home delivery
• Speed of delivery and alternatives to residential delivery
• Retailers following Amazon in developing last mile capability
• Alibaba delivering worldwide within 72 hours - and the environment
• Amazon's commitment to the last mile in the USA and around the world
• Bricks-and-mortar retail and omnichannel
• Click-and-collect (BOPIS) at Walmart and other retailers
• Allocating retail floorspace to in-store fulfilment, click-and-collect or drive-thru options
• E-commerce killing bad retail experiences
• Small retailers leveraging delivery to become an omnichannel retailer
• e-grocery's growth in 2020 - and can it be made profitable?
• Security of online grocery deliveries
• Amazon and pharmaceuticals
• UPS, FedEx and home healthcare
• And finally… who said drones are stupid?

The USPS Office of Inspector General has published research into Generation Z and the mail. Dr Joanna Wu Gerhardt researcher at USPS OIG and one of the co-authors of the report "Generation Z and the mail", joins me to discuss some of the key findings from the report:

• Defining Generation Z
• Do Gen Z digital natives know anything about the postal service?
• Kinds of mail Gen Z receives and sends
• Communications preferences across digital and physical media
• Parents, Generation Z, and visiting the post office
• Strategies for engaging with Gen Z
• Advertising mail and marketing mail
• Promoting parcel / package delivery to Gen Z - including augmented reality
• Technology and valuing relationships

Tom Day, Chief Commercial Officer and Chief Financial Officer at the International Post Corporation (IPC), joins me to discuss reducing emissions in the postal sector:

• Six key aims for SMMS
• Recyclable packaging products sold by postal operators
• Reusable packaging products
• The impact of 2020 on posts' emissions reduction strategies
• Workload for letter delivery compared to parcel delivery
• Strategies postal operators are using to reduce last mile emissions
• Electric vehicles and the source of electricity (renewable vs fossil fuel)
• Life cycle analysis and the goal of reducing or eliminating carbon emissions
• Rooftop solar panels and powering the post's processing cycle during the night
• Return on investment for renewables
• Savings that can be driven by building inspections and proper building maintenance
• Monitoring partner emissions (e.g. subcontractor drivers and franchised post offices)
• Suppliers reporting emissions - and customer expectations of posts to report emissions
• Government and customer pressure to reduce last mile emissions
• The urgency of reducing emissions (compared to far-off carbon reduction targets)

Brexit and the STOP Act are almost upon us! These two events will reshape global cross-border e-commerce. Martyn Noble and David Spottiswood, co-founders of Hurricane Modular Commerce join me to discuss:

• The countdown to Brexit - implications for countries inside and outside the EU
• Is it too late to start planning for post-Brexit cross-border trade?
• Data and customs
• Why Brexit is a global problem, not just an EU problem
• The need for quality data
• Implications for posts if they're not ready for Brexit and STOP Act - along with the challenges of ICS2 and VAT changes
• Growth in cross-border volumes being carried by posts
• What will happen to US-bound parcels without complete data (EAD/AED)? Will 700m parcels be returned? Who will pay? What about the environment?
• Logistics networks designed to move parcels, not store parcels
• Implications for air cargo capacity
• Sweden's imposition of VAT on inbound e-commerce shipments - and implications for collecting taxes and return of unclaimed parcels
• Showing duties and taxes in e-commerce shopping cart - price transparency of fully landed cost
• Avoiding the doorstep surprise
• Demand outstripping capacity in air cargo
• What postal operators have to do to get cross-border right, including:
  • Missing incomplete data (including HS6 codes), and vague descriptions
  • Shipper and consignee data
  • Valuation of contents
  • Prohibited and restricted goods, denied parties, and countries of origin
• Opportunities for postal operators who get cross-border right - in both B2B and B2C
• Reducing unit costs and growing profitability
• Postal operators partnering with private carriers for cross-border shipments
• Checking data and avoiding data leakage
• C2C parcels: the final frontier!
• Marketplace platforms and cross-border opportunities

What's the future for Royal Mail's Universal Service Obligation (USO)? It's not just about letters! Tim Harrison, Senior Policy Researcher at Citizens Advice, joins me to discuss:

• Role of Citizens Advice as a consumer advocate
• Royal Mail's USO for letter delivery and parcel delivery
• Comparison with letter delivery obligations in other countries
• Royal Mail exceeding regulatory obligations for parcel delivery
• Remote surcharges of up to 51% - and the definition of remote in the UK
• Which delivery companies deliver to remote parts of the UK?
• Digitally excluded customers and how they interact with the post office and letters network
• The 5.3 million digitally excluded people in the UK
• Quality of the letters service
• Reliability of parcel delivery
• Penalties on consumers for using the mail
• The consequences for consumers who can't access the mail
• Why some people in the UK are unable to reliably and regularly access their letters
• How to give vulnerable people access to the mail
• Making pricing of mail and mail-related services (such as redirections) affordable for everyone
• The role of Ofcom (the UK regulator)

AED/EAD is a hot topic in international postal circles right now! Kate Muth, Executive Director at IMAG (International Mailers Advisory Group), shares an update on sharing advance electronic data for cross-border parcels - and compliance with the USA's STOP Act:

• Background to the STOP Act
• Movement of illicit narcotics through the international postal system
• AED (or EAD) to help customs authorities
• Timelines for providing AED
• Will all countries meet 100% AED provision?
• The OIG's research into AED compliance
• China's progress in providing AED
• Exemptions and waivers
• Untracked items
• Remediation for international items without AED
• Rules for dealing with non-compliant items
• US capacity to store inbound international items, impact on quality of service and cost
• Will non-compliant parcels be destroyed?
• Collecting data at the post office counter
• Who pays for what?
• Truthfulness of customs declarations
• Other countries demanding inbound article data
• Harmonisation codes
• Is the data helping authorities find illicit substances in the mail?
• The importance of sharing data for cross-border parcels

Josh Dinneen, Chief Commercial Officer at LaserShip, joins me to discuss research into shopping trends during the pandemic - and what all that means for the delivery sector:

• Older generations embracing ecommerce
• Indicators for continued strength in parcel volumes
• Retailers going bankrupt and store closures during the pandemic, compared to online fulfilment
• Customer preferences and behaviours relating to shipping costs
• Free shipping: is it now a basic requirement?
• Is free delivery incompatible with fast delivery?
• Customer expectations on speed by generation
• How retailers can differentiate their delivery options
• Delivery satisfaction
• Delivery's role in retaining customers
• What customers want from the delivery experience
• B2C delivery preferences - including time windows
• Virtual proof of delivery
• Predictions for peak season - including retailers bringing sales forward to make it an elongated peak
• Post-Christmas sales

Khaled Naim, co-founder and CEO of Onfleet, joins me to discuss the modern customer experience in delivery:

• The importance of the e-commerce shopper's customer experience
• How Amazon is raising customer expectations in delivery
• Three ways to optimise customer delivery experience
• The role drivers can play in enhancing the customer experience
• Real-time customer support
• Customer demands for same-day delivery
• Can retailers offer a high standard of customer delivery experience?
• Route optimisation
• Reducing failed first-time delivery attempts
• Communications with the parcel recipient
• Developments in e-commerce stimulated by the pandemic
• Changes to consumer ordering habits
• The need for speed
• Creative solutions to the capacity crunch
• Contactless delivery

Parcel locker evangelist and bpost VP Locker Boost Catherine De Baets joins me to talk about bpost's Ecozone project to go emission-free in the last mile:

• bpost parcel locker boost programme
• Background to the Ecozone in the Belgian city of Mechelen - and working towards being completely emission-free
• Combining a dense locker network with electric vehicles
• Cooperating with local retailers
• Creating mini-hubs
• What "lean lockers" are
• Creating a flexible parcel locker network
• The "Four-S" model for determining locker locations
• Physical parcel pick-up points (post offices and PUDOs) in the Ecozone
• Promoting parcel lockers to locals in Mechelen
• Customer delivery preferences
• Next stages of the Ecozone delivery concept
• Reducing risk of customers using their car to collect parcels from lockers
• bpost personnel involvement

Lee Spratt, CEO of DHL eCommerce Solutions Americas, joins me to talk about preparations for peak season 2020:

• Events that usually kick off peak season
• Bringing forward peak planning
• Parcel volumes during 2020 that have exceeded peak 2019
• Asking e-commerce retailers to forecast and manage volumes
• Working with last mile partners (including work share arrangements with US Postal Service)
• Balancing peak loads in the last mile
• Hiring surge for 2020 peak season
• Where temporary staff will go
• Additional space to accommodate extra volumes
• Post-peak plans for additional sites
• Changes in consumer behaviour bringing purchases forward
• Employee safety and changes in procedures
• Having a multi-carrier delivery strategy
• Artificial intelligence and using data to be more efficient