4 Common Customer Complaints About Home Delivery - and How You Can Resolve Them

This article is brought to you by Retail Technology Review: 4 Common Customer Complaints About Home Delivery - and How You Can Resolve Them.

By Richard Grant, freelance writer.

E-commerce and home delivery go hand in hand if you want to increase customer satisfaction and provide a positive experience. However, you can’t make everyone happy, so you should brace yourself for various complaints.

Still, just because some people can’t be pleased, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to solve the issues that are often brought up in complaints.

Since home delivery is often the most problematic segment, here are some of the most common complaints and the solutions applied by successful delivery companies.

1. Lack of Order Status

According to a recent study, customers’ number one complaint when it comes to delivery has to do with a lack of transparency when it comes to the order status.

Few things are more frustrating than seeing an order you can’t wait to arrive stuck in “processing…” forever. Plus, the frustration only grows when you check in daily and nothing seems to change. And, to add insult to injury, you get a call one day when you’re the busiest you’ve ever been, saying that your order will be delivered and that you have to be at home.

People like to know what’s going on with the products they order, so it’s only natural they’ll avoid websites and delivery companies that don’t know how to communicate.

Solution: Keep Customers in the Loop

The best way to solve this problem is by implementing an order-tracking solution that allows customers to see what’s going on with their orders in stages, from the moment the order has been registered to the moment it has been entrusted to the courier.

Plus, you get bonus points if the courier company also has a tracking system that lets customers know the day and approximate time interval when to expect the order to arrive.

2. Delays and Cancellations

Another thing that frustrates customers into quitting a brand altogether is having an order canceled without notice. Also delays!

Now, delays and cancellations will happen, especially during busy periods for online shopping, like Thanksgiving, Black Friday, or the winter holidays. However, you can still manage your customers’ expectations and come out of this unscathed if you teach your customer service team how to deal with unhappy customers.

But the responsibility also rests on the shoulders of the delivery companies, especially since most delays happen in the last-mile delivery sector.

Solution: Use Delivery Management Software

As an e-commerce business, it’s a good practice to give customers an accurate estimate of the delivery timeframe. This way, even if there are slight delays, people won’t get mad if the courier manages to fit in the given timeframe.

As a delivery company, you can manage drivers using delivery management software. This way, it will be easier for drivers to choose the optimal delivery route, and you will be able to monitor the entire activity.

3. Long Delivery Times

If you promise second-day delivery and you don’t deliver, customers are going to get pissed. On the other hand, if you’re a food delivery company and your drivers don’t make it to the destination within the promised time interval, you’ll have hangry customers looking for revenge online.

Solution:

One way to solve this problem, as a restaurant owner, would be to take over delivery. This way, you can control how the food reaches customers and address any complaints right away. If this is not possible, implement a system that updates the customers about the status of their orders.

Lastly, it helps to know your patterns. If you know things get busy around noon, then make sure you have enough drivers on hand to keep things moving at a fast pace.

4. Rude Delivery Drivers

Yes, this is one of the most common complaints you find online when it comes to delivery companies! Rude drivers who don’t know how to speak with the customers or, worse, expect to be tipped a certain amount.

Solution:

The best way to deal with this is by training your employees to interact with the customers. It’s not always easy to stay friendly and polite, but being rude won’t solve anything. If you’re working with a delivery company that employs rude drivers, it’s best to drop the collaboration.

Wrap Up

Whether we like it or not, delivery is part of today's shopping process, and any glitches that happen here can reflect badly on your company. Therefore, the only way to move forward is by addressing the most common complaints that pop up in the interactions with customers.