B2B SaaS
Advanced Automating Point of Delivery (PODs)
Automate the flow of orders through our Points of Distribution (POD) units to improve efficiency and sustainability of delivery in the last mile. Integrate the remote Point of Delivery (POD) units management into our Operation management system (OMS).
After the Advanced POD features were realised, 30% of our orders were delivered completely by POD.
My Role
After getting the brief, I map out current Service journeys of POD delivery and Directly delivery.
I interviewed stakeholders and shadowed their work, extracting the required new data points from their working files.
I worked with Product Owner, Business Analyst, Front-End engineer.
I worked on this from inception to launch and I will also research for any future iterations.
Project
Integrate last-mile delivery optimization into the internal operating system
Teamwork
3-4 weeks
Tools
Miro | Adobe XD | Zeplin
Service statement overview of PODs last-mile delivery
We’re breaking free from the old “one delivery after another” logistics model with our Points of Distribution - PODs. These refrigerated units use under-utilized spaces in key urban locations. They’re loaded with products by truck overnight, which are then collected and delivered to customers using electric cargo bikes or empty capacity in smaller vehicles already making journeys into our cities.
This model brings flexibility, cost savings, and a longer shelf-life for your products. We are actively reducing traffic levels in peak hours, taking big lorries off the road and reducing emissions into our city air by up to 50%.
Problem Statement
The whole model of PODs in the trial stage.
The PODs management hasn't been recorded in the daily order management process yet.
The management of PODs should be subdivided into the level of each POD door and able to manage the capacity of each PODs door in OMS.
Assign orders to PODs is done in Excel, which is difficult to read and easy to lose data. The data of this POD order assignment is also not recorded in OMS.
Interview and workshop
Understanding our audience
The main users are the Operation team, especial the Operations Development Manager who arranges daily last-mile delivery.
Other stakeholders are warehouse inventory staff, third-party last-mile delivery partners, customers
Technical approaches
Integrate PODs management in our central Order Management System (OMS) including three parts:
1. Add PODs as a new data point in each single order detail.
2. Manage POD stations, each mobile container's capacity.
3. Assign PODs order to a particular POD container.
Service Journey
We mapped out the whole service journey of PODs delivery. And documentary in our BE for further developments.
Flow Chart
In this diagram, I map out Users’ actions, Responses to OMS, New feature actions.
User frow
The solution
Add PODs as a new data point in each single order detail.
We will need to separate the POD order and the direct delivery order. And how to do last-mile delivery would need to be shown on each order detail.
Some tricky challenges here are POD stations have restricted products (can't contain frozen products) and restricted containers (pallet is too big). In the end, we manage to get this logic into shape.
Manage POD stations, and each mobile container's capacity.
We have a few PODs stations and mobile POD containers over London at this moment.
So recording where are the POD Container and the total capacity of the POD Container is the main goal.
Assign PODs orders to a particular POD container.
Orders for customers that have agreed to accept their deliveries via POD are processed via the OMS.
The orders are sent to their associated POD station overnight. On the day of delivery, our last-mile delivery partners collect the roll cages and make the final delivery to the customer's location.
Result 🌱
After the Advanced POD features were realized, 30% of our orders were delivered completely by POD.
We are actively reducing traffic levels in peak hours, taking big lorries off the road and reducing emissions into our city air.
Reflection & Next Step
This was a very complex integration, requiring a lot of research and planning upfront to develop the strategy and map down the user journeys. Collectiv Food’s POD system is an important innovation in its supply model.
In the next step, we will still work on the automation of the entire assignment, such as automatically booking drivers with third-party partners, and automatically generating door code…
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