Comment: Best practice advice to counter the snow threat

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In December 2010, the snowfall that affected the entire UK for a prolonged period presented one of the sternest tests for our industry yet.

By David J Smith

The fulfilment of online orders was seriously disrupted by roads being closed, vehicles not being able to drop off or collect orders, and depots being overloaded or under-stocked as carriers could not reach them.

In February of this year, IMRG published a review of Christmas e-fulfilment 2010 based on data from major carriers and some retailers, in order to develop best practice guidelines should disruption on that scale happen again.

The lessons learned from this report included taking the following steps:
Increase capacity: carriers and logistics companies and e-retailers should prepare for Christmas by increasing operations and customer service staff, trailer capacity, working hours and offering additional deliveries (including Sunday).

Bring forward last despatch day: if roads are blocked and vehicles are becoming stranded, make an honest assessment of the advertised last despatch day and bring it forward in good time if necessary.

Bring forward the last order date: retailers responded to the move by carriers by bringing forward their last order date in specific regions.
Provide accurate and updated information: specific information appears to be the one thing that everyone needed last year. Different carriers are able to cope with the same conditions in different ways, due to the location of their hubs and depots, their operational capacity, specific contingency plans and their supporting infrastructure. This means there is not one overall position and, when provided, detailed information, carrier by carrier / area by area, helps e-retailers to keep dispatching and keep their customers informed.

Provide alternative delivery points: last year many shoppers found that although the delivery drivers could not get to them, they were able to travel to a limited extent and e-retailers and carriers took advantage of this. For example, one e-retailer told us that they stopped taking orders for pre-Christmas home delivery on Sunday 18th December but kept the 'Click and Collect' option (where shoppers can order online but collect from their local store) open until Wednesday 21st December.

Prudently manage the trailer fleet: one of the effects of the weather is that trailers, usually used just for moving packages, had to be used to store packages to be released into the networks when the weather cleared. This removed these trailers from circulation and reduced the capacity of the delivery networks considerably.

Use multiple carriers: many e-retailers use more than one carrier as a matter of course and during the bad weather this seems to pay additional dividends. Individual carriers cope differently with the conditions in different parts of the country due to the location of their hubs and depots, their operational capacity and their supporting infrastructure.

Long –range weather forecasts are notoriously unreliable and the truth is that no-one really knows whether we will suffer a winter as harsh as last year's again. As an industry however, we are sure that we have taken appropriate steps to help retailers and carriers be prepared for it just in case.

David J Smith is Chief Marketing & Communications Officer, IMRG

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