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How is Fastway Couriers embracing technology?

Sarah Stowe

In an effort to cater to the modern customer Fastway Couriers has devised a new technology, and it’s actively increasing its online presence.

CEO Richard Thame believes technology and innovation are critical to the success of any business, and explains Fastway’s new technologies enhance convenience for customers.

“With the introduction of technology, now customers have an application that identifies the locations that Fastway service, our price, who the courier is, plus direct access to the courier who’ll come to pick up their parcels.”

Fastway Couriers recently developed its Parcel Connect system, which offers an alternative to the traditional calling cards that require people collect packages from the post office.

“Most people work during post office trading hours, making it difficult to for them to collect their parcel,” Thame says.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

“Customers can elect to have their parcel delivered directly to the local Parcel Connect agent and their Fastway courier will drop the parcel there; or if a customer isn’t home, the courier will leave a calling card and deliver the parcel to the local Parcel Connect agent where the customer can pick it up on their way home.

“We’re targeting locations that have great parking, that are safe, well lit, and open longer hours. We’re saying ‘Come and partner with us and our courier can drop off parcels there; they’ll be securely scanned in and be kept in a safe location,’” he explains.

He adds Parcel Connect also caters to people that are looking to send a parcel or package. “They can print a label from our website at home, drop the parcel into their local Parcel Connect agent and use a courier service at a much lower cost to manage their delivery for them.”

The service was introduced in March, and there are currently 120 Parcel Connect agents operating in Australia, with more to come.

“Our objective over the next year is to have 700 of these agents, one in every courier franchise territory. Our long term goals are then to have well over 1,000 Parcel Connect agents where customers can have a parcel delivered, or alternatively they can drop a parcel in to,” says Thame.


Fastway Couriers’ Sydney depot

DEVELOPMENTS IN ONLINE

Fastway Couriers is also focusing its attention online – earlier in the year the company established a partnership with eBay, and its developed a new online service for franchisees.

“In what we believe is a world first; we have provided courier franchisees with the latest technology via an online portal that covers key aspects of their business’s performance.

“The portal allows them to track customer information, delivery performance and measure the impact of changes they’re making on their business in real time. We’ve also set up a national customer service centre to provide customers with a more effective and seamless experience,” Thame explains.

“The initiatives we’ve introduced over the past 12 months have led to our most important achievement, which is to lift courier franchisee earnings across the board.”

Fastway Couriers has also started targeting online retailers of all sizes, rather than solely the small to medium sized bricks-and-mortar businesses it traditionally services. 

“Initially, we started talking to an increased number of small businesses. We felt there was a terrific synergy between our franchisees that were driving around the suburbs twice a day every day and small business owner-operators. Following our rebrand, we then identified some of the bigger online retailers and demonstrated to them that we had a compelling proposition,” Thames recalled.

“Today we service some of the largest names in online retail: companies like OzSale, Naked Wines, Virgin Wines and Laithwaites Wines. We identified industry segments where we could provide a difference and do a really good job, and then went and chased specific customers where we felt there was a great fit between their business and the service that we could provide.”

All in all he says the shift online has enhanced the business’s growth rather dramatically. “Over the last 12 months we’ve achieved double digit sales and profit growth by partnering with online retailers to offer innovative solutions to help these businesses save money and grow.”