Axida - Explode the myth with CEVA
The delivery and fulfilment system HDi from Axida, as used by CEVA to handle the Habitat deliveries, is reviewed by Geoff Tittensor – a retail consultant working with RMDP Ltd.
Advice for selling on the Internet is directed towards the look and ease of use of the site, then encouraging traffic and persuading the customer to order. However, the real difficulty once the order is placed is fulfilment:
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To keep customers happy quick reactions are needed. Web purchasers expect the next day delivery typically provided by companies like Amazon.
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Customers know that supply chains are shortened, overheads are lower and therefore they expect better prices. It is, therefore, essential for retailers to keep stock holding to a minimum and carefully manage the supply chain to meet price expectations.
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For many goods, the customer needs to be at home to accept the delivery and retailers need appropriate mechanisms to cope.
Fulfilment is not a problem exclusive to e-commerce as traditional retailing shares these difficulties.
Habitat has devolved customer fulfilment responsibilities to CEVA, and CEVA ensures efficient discharge of these duties by using the HDi systems from Axida.
"We are able to provide our client and our customers with a reliable and effective delivery service by using Axida HDi" said Keith Dennis, General Manager of CEVA’s Home Delivery Service.
The three levels of difficulty in home delivery depend, largely, on the type of product (the first and easiest one is only possible via the web).
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Downloads. Typically, eBooks or software are delivered in this way which is easy, cheap and fast.
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Small ticket products can be handled by the usual post or parcel services. Again swift and economical ways to handle deliveries.
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Big ticket products are where the real problems begin, and where Axida’s HDi product comes into its own, supporting the following attributes
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Delivery at a particular date and time.
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Multiple visits made to the customer’s home. Consider an order for a product which requires a visit for a survey, followed by a delivery visit and finally a fitter may need to visit to assemble or install the product. Each visit requires the attentions of staff with different skill sets.
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There may be a requirement for more than one person to accompany the delivery, or for a particular type of vehicle may be required.
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Warranties may be attached to the goods, which require the customer to deal with some paperwork upon delivery.
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Credit facilities may need to be arranged.
Keith Dennis of CEVA explained that "The unique features of the Axida software allow us to run our delivery systems efficiently".
The HDi system is not a stock control system, a supply chain management system nor a product cataloguing system. Instead it has an open interface to all of these systems, controlling the process of delivery and installation.
Keith Dennis added "in order to run a successful delivery business, we need to keep both our clients and our clients’ customers happy. The most critical single factor that helps achieve both of these is having a consistently high ‘first time delivery success rate’. A high first time delivery rate obviously keeps the Habitat customer happy (he got what he wanted when he wanted it), but it also drives down costs and keeps Habitat happy. HDi contains tools that monitor staff and vehicle utilisation, used to manage resources and so reduce costs."
Also important in keeping the customer happy is to quickly spot when there is a problem. Any physical delivery system can have problems e.g. vehicle breakdown. Customers are happier if you keep them informed and alert them early on to non-delivery and to rearrange
Three major aspects of HDi combine to achieve significant delivery benefits:
1. Delivery slotting. Customers can choose a date, time and place for delivery. Before offering a choice of delivery slots, HDi calculates the delivery mechanism and supply chain, determining minimum lead times. It also considers the product requirements (number of men, required skills, number of visits) the address (which area is it in), and a combination of product and address (there may be different areas for different products).
HDi can cater for complex supply chains of any length. Trigger points can be set as required throughout the delivery chain, and as the order passes each trigger it can be individually date and time stamped. Controlling the process at this level of detail improves customer service.
2. The workflow system advises on exceptions in the system. The configurable triggers allow order monitoring by presenting orders requiring action to the operator. For example, information may be recorded when the order is placed, whenever the customer makes an enquiry, at each receipt, pick and dispatch point in the supply chain, and for each visit made or attempted to be made to the customer. The system can be extended to include a GPS system so van and order whereabouts can be reported.
Results of the delivery process can be recorded, assigning configurable reason codes and capturing statistics such as driver name, vehicle identity, mileage covered and arrival and departure times for each visit. Discrepancies are then presented through the workflow system for action.
The workflow system not only presents exceptions, but also highlights potential failures, allowing contact with the customer at an early stage. Workflow also supports customer enquiries. Searches may be made by name, telephone number, post code or order number. Enquiries can then show a full order history including tracking through the supply chain, exceptions and all customer contacts.
The Flight Deck is a graphical management tool allowing delivery managers to view resource utilisation by area and delivery slot. Managers can quickly see where extra resources are required, or where excess is available and make necessary changes. A simple traffic light system makes the task easier (red – over used resources, amber – resource usage ok and green – delivery slots available). Users can adjust the thresholds for the colour changes to suit the circumstances.
HDi interfaces with existing operational systems such as stock and supply chain systems. Established businesses need to react quickly to satisfy new demands, such as a faster ‘supplier to customer’ supply chain. HDi certainly helps by controlling the delivery process. Legacy systems only need to expose stock levels and significant events such as receipts and picks.
HDi is flexible because it employs up to the minute software technologies and techniques. It runs on the Microsoft .net platform. Designed to be a genuine 3-tier architecture, it has the advantage of making changes to the front end user interface very easy. It is as at home with a web browser, Kiosk, web TV or a traditional business PC. Should customers wish to use a database other than Microsoft’s SQL 2005 this can be achieved, as the system is designed to be OLE-DB compliant.
The architecture makes deployment of the software malleable. It can reside entirely on the customer server or deployed on an ASP basis with the customer accessing it via a thin client as required. The architecture also makes the system scaleable. It can be used by the smallest to the largest client.
In the Habitat / CEVA installation, the system is run on CEVA computers. In other cases, for other clients, Axida host the software on their own web servers.
The type of goods purchased over the Internet will change over time. As goods move up from the commonplace books and CDs to more complex and bigger ticket products such as brown or white goods, the HDi product is perfectly placed to provide solutions for the delivery process .
For more information contact Axida.