Amazon has become the most popular etailer in the UK, in-part thanks to its low prices but also its flexible delivery options, allowing for customers to make the choice between free, first-class, next-day and expedited delivery options. In the US the firm is now even looking into same-day delivery!
Here in the UK, where a same-day delivery infrastructure isn't currently in-place, Amazon has been attempting to tackle another sore point, missed deliveries. Whilst customers can chose from a range of delivery options, they can't chose who actually delivers parcels and what they can do with them if no one's home and so, often missed deliveries wind-up back at the depo or with the wrong neighbour, adding further delay and hassle to a delivery.
For a while now, in London, the firm has been offering a Collect+ service, where parcels can be delivered to stores that are open during guaranteed hours, to ensure that a parcel will be locally available for collection at a certain time, outside of normal working hours, with no further delay. It was clear that expansion of this service to the rest of the UK would be a costly endeavor and so instead, Amazon is going to rely on almost 5,000 local corner shops throughout the country to act as Collect+ delivery points.
Soon your nearest collection point could be just around the corner, no more time off work to wait in for that latest GPU, driving to the depo the next day to pickup your new laptop or fighting with that neighbour (you know the one) who claims that they never received your Android Tablet.
