Great Idea: Package Delivery
The other day, I was waiting for a package to be delivered by UPS. This proved to be quite inconvenient since I was forced to wait at home all afternoon for this package to be delivered. You see, I could tell from UPS’ website that the package would definitely be delivered today, but not the time it would arrive. I had to be there for the delivery because it required a signature.
It seems to me that this model of package delivery (tracking on the website only to sit at home and wait for the driver to show up) is about five years behind many other services that harness the full potential of the Web to improve customer service.
With all that Google’s doing with public transportation tracking, why can’t this be applied to package tracking? Imagine: you know that a package is due to be delivered today and through UPS’ website, able to decipher the route number/driver that will be delivering your package. Using Google Delivery (made-up), you could then log in to see on a map the driver’s route, stops ahead of yours, and an estimated time of delivery. If providing the driver’s route proves to be a problem security-wise, why not simply have a way to show the number of stops ahead of yours plus an estimated time of delivery? Taking this a step further, you could also provide a way to send a message to your delivery person through the website regarding where to leave a package, or any special instructions.
Just a new idea on a foggy Thursday morning…
