Online retail has taken over from high street shopping in a big way. People prefer having all of their options at their fingertips and the convenience of having things delivered straight to their door. That means there’s a lot of work out there for the companies that are delivering all of those parcels. You could get in on the action as well if you start your own courier company. With so many new online stores popping up all of the time, you shouldn’t be short of work as long as you market yourself properly. However, that doesn’t mean anybody can start a courier business and make a success out of it. There are a lot of simple mistakes that you can make on the way that could sink the business entirely. If you’re going to start your own courier company, make sure that you don’t do these things.
Ignoring Insurance
When you’re running a courier company, you’ve got a load of drivers operating heavy vehicles and you’re also responsible for all of the packages that you’re carrying. If your drivers are in an accident, you could be held responsible and you need to pay for any damage to the vehicle. You’ll also have to pay to replace any products that you damage in transit which is why it’s so important that you have good insurance. Get proper insurance for all of your drivers and vehicles and make sure that you’ve got liability insurance to cover any breakages. If you don’t and something happens, you’ll end up having to foot a big bill that could cripple the business.
Not Offering A Tracking Service
People are pretty impatient these days when it comes to ordering things online. You’ve got companies like Amazon offering next day shipping on most of their products and that’s changed expectations about how quickly things should arrive. That’s why people are always keen to track packages and see how close they are. If you don’t have a tracking service, your customers will get annoyed and you might lose business. All good delivery management software for couriers and dispatchers should come with a tracking feature. If yours doesn’t, you need to switch to a different one that does. A tracking service is a basic feature that all of your competitors will be offering so if you aren’t, you’re going to fall behind.
Not Protecting Customer Data
When you’re delivering parcels direct to customers, you’re being trusted with their personal information. It’s so important that you protect that customer data, especially as the threat of cyber-attacks is always looming. If you lose all of that personal information, you’re going to lose the trust of your customers and you might even end up having to pay a big fine. That’s why it’s so important that you have a well functioning IT department to handle security for you.
Make even one of these basic mistakes when you’re setting up your courier company and you’ll struggle to compete with the competition. But if you can avoid them, you should be able to make some good money.