‘Bringing it all home’ says Triangle
The 2015 edition of Triangle Management Services’ UK Domestic B2C Express Parcels Distribution Survey has found that although alternative delivery options (such as click and collect) are making an impact on the traditional home delivery model, such solutions still have a lot of catching up to do. Over 80% of all deliveries are destined for a home address, according to the shippers who took part in the survey. The closest rival to home delivery is the work place address, which accounted for 14% of all deliveries. In-store click and collect (just over 1%) and parcel shops and parcel lockers (with less than 1% combined) are still far behind.
Those carriers that deliver the greatest percentage of their parcels to homes are Yodel, Hermes (both at 90%) and Royal Mail (87%). The carriers that deliver a greater percentage to alternative solutions are DPD (4%) and APC Overnight (3%).
The home is also at the heart of the returns picture. More than half of the shippers interviewed (51%, up 10% on 2014) said that consumers prefer to return items directly from their home being collected by the designated delivery carrier, while 35% (down 8% from 2014) indicated collection via the nearest post office.
Although the alternative delivery methods are used more for returns than for deliveries, they are still relatively uncommon. Only 4% of shippers (unchanged from 2014) said that they received in-store returns and 3% (up 1%) indicated that they handle returns via parcel shops.
Triangle conducted some 460 in-depth telephone interviews with B2C shippers for the 2015 survey, and collected a total of 545 benchmark service ratings for the twelve main carriers used for home deliveries.
Carriers benchmarked in the survey include the major global integrators TNT Express, UPS and FedEx, along with home delivery experts Hermes, Yodel and Royal Mail, plus Parcelforce Worldwide, DPD, Interlink, APC Overnight, UK Mail and freight parcel specialists DX Freight. In total, twelve carriers offering UK domestic home delivery services are rated by their customers, and compared against each other in this study.
Triangle’s UK Domestic B2C Express Parcels Distribution Survey was first published in 2008 and is emerging as the industry standard benchmarking study for the home delivery sector.
Triangle’s CEO, Neil Jackson, commented: “Having produced the Triangle B2C survey now for seven years, we know and understand the value of the UK Domestic Express Survey programme to our clients and have included new questions and areas to keep it relevant and up-to-date. The home delivery sector is changing rapidly and this latest report continues to highlight areas for improvement that the carriers must address in order to retain customers and remain competitive.”
Triangle Management Services Ltd, founded in 1984, delivers a unique range of business services to leading companies and senior executives managing and shaping the mail and express industry. Triangle’s extensive portfolio of services includes high-level conferences, online and print media, industry specific research, strategic consultancy and recruitment, and provides access to the senior players in the sector worldwide.
The price of the survey is £12,450 (+ VAT where applicable). Triangle also produces a UK Domestic B2B Express Parcels Distribution Survey, of which the 2015 edition has been published in May.
For further information please contact Triangle’s Research Team on +44(0)1628 642910 or email: Helen Daniels, Research Manager.
