The quest to remove the pain points in ecommerce delivery continue. There are already a plethora of solutions and approaches on the table. Dropbox lockers at stations and supermarkets. Ir you can have you item delivered to a local shop so you can collect it later. There’s Click & Collect. Delivery within the hour. To name but a few.
But why shouldn’t your car act as a secure drop box for delivery companies? That’s the premise that Volvo are exploring. At the World Mobile Conference in Barcelona this week, Volvo has revealed their Roam Delivery service which would allow connected cars to act as delivery stations with drivers authorising couriers to access the boot of their car.
Sounds pretty far fetched to me. But according to an Internet Retailing report it has proved a popular idea in surveys and trials so far.
5 Responses
Its not that crazy.
I have a regular customer and when she is not at home the couriers all know to leave the package in the boot of her car which she leaves unlocked.
Not quite what Volvo are doing but it seems to work quite well.
Over the years we have all heard horror stories about parcels being left in totally bonkers places. The old faithful that often comes up is that a parcel has been left inside the dustbin on dustbin day. When the customer gets home the dustbin is empty and the parcel is on its way to the dump.
So let us think about putting parcels in the car boot.. Cars on the whole fall into two types. Those, usually Saloon Cars where you cannot see into the car boot from the ouitside and Estate Cars where often you can see into the boot area from the outside.
In rural areas cars are often left unlocked and if it is unlocked for the Courier to drop the parcel in it is also unlocked for the thief to take it out again if he(or she) can see it. However many live in Urban Areas and may park on the road. I wonder how many would be happy leaving their car boot unlocked?
I work from home and often my neighbours leave notes on their doors directing Couriers etc to leave parcels with me if they are out. It must be better than leaving it in the dustbin(although round here we put out black plastic bags rather than dustbins).
But often in Rural Areas we have regular Couriers who get to know their regular customers and get to know where is best to leave parcels. Of course in this day and age most cars have central locking with a programmed key fob. Is Volvo really suggesting that the local Courier should be issued with such a key fob or even anything similar?
As long as ebay introduce a buyer tick box waiving ebay buyer protection, the right to leave feedback, and to open cases, I’ll ship to the moon.
With on street parking I would have to inform the courier the night before where my car would be parked (and left unlocked)!
Not to mention that the boot light is a bit dodgy and if the boot is not closed correctly the light will stay on (and flatten the battery [the last time this happened I had to had to have the car towed to the garage for recharging]).
would invalidate car insurance and ebay protection surely?
although i have seen couriers leave parcels under a car.