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Fuel stabilisers and fuel costs.

March 8, 2011 By

Good news for us motorists, or so it would seem. On the other hand some news reports are suggesting that unless motorists pay for all the potholes to be filled in, the roads will be virtually undriveable anyway.

The Government is hinting strongly that it won’t be adding the 1p per litre fuel tax at the next budget. At the moment it costs £102.00 to fill our Transit up with conventional fuel and £60 with LPG. This of pushes up the price of delivery.

As one person said on the Facebook update at the weekend “Filling your car up is a better diet than weight watchers, you can’t afford to eat and run a car”.

Think about it from a business point of view, how can the customer keep paying for goods that are increasing in price constantly? They can’t, wages are not keeping up with the cost of living and as a business creeping expenses have to be watched carefully.

Let’s hope the proposed fuel stabiliser is pushed through and the cut in costs is passed on. It was rumoured that inflated prices were being charged in supermarket filling stations as they had had a poor trading quarter. How much truth there was in that rumour I don’t know. What I do know is Tesco is currently more expensive by 3p a litre than our local Jet garage. Traditionally it was the other way around.

There are still talks of rural area discounts which would be a step in the right direction. But what counts as rural? Some parts of Essex like Burnham on Crouch are remote, the Dengie and parts of Colchester. These areas may not be considered rural but having worked extensively in these areas for the last 10 years, I’d have a hard time convincing the residents who can get a bus to Chelmsford on a Monday, but the return bus isn’t until Wednesday.

Fuel and fuel prices are going to be on everyones lips for the foreseeable future.

Let’s hope it’s because the price is finally coming down again.

Kevin

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Filed Under: Courier Business, Greener driving Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

If it’s valuable a same day courier should deliver it

October 13, 2010 By

If you have something that is valuable there isn’t a doubt in my mind who should deliver it. It should be us, or a another courier within the same day courier industry. If we cannot deliver something, we are always happy to recommend others within the transport industry.

Say you have a variety of items that need delivering –  the same day courier can inventory them at the collection point and call through what exactly they are carrying on your behalf. This service is popular with items that have to be returned under court instruction or a delivery of time sensitive materials. You just let the courier company know that this is required at the time of booking.

At the end destination or the delivery point, the inventory is handed over and signed for again. No loss of goods in transit and evidence that the delivery has taken place. Everyone in the chain is happy at what has taken place.

Compare that to other delivery services and what it would cost to factor this in?

Sometimes the personal side of delivery can be overlooked which is a shame. Good customer service plays a part in lots of peoples businesses. It plays a huge part in ours.

When you call us, a human being answers. Sometimes it goes to voicemail – that is because we are on the phone.

We answer our emails swiftly, respond to tweets and queries on Facebook.

We know the true value of human interaction in our business. Yes, we track our vehicles but you can also speak to the driver, which is dead handy if there is a traffic jam and you need updating as to when your cargo will arrive. Roads and driving conditions change rapidly and that also affects how your items are delivered.

If it’s valuable, knowing and talking to the people in the delivery chain can make all the difference.

  • Things don’t get lost
  • They don’t get broken
  • They don’t get left behind
  • You have complete peace of mind

If items are that important – we have delivered court evidence, medical samples, fuel samples, then you need to be able to communicate and have peace of mind.  We provide both.

Kevin

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Filed Under: Courier Services, Sameday Courier Tagged With: , ,

Do you trust your courier?

September 2, 2010 By

A New York art courier, James Haggerty, was recently entrusted with a painting worth £800k, and he delivered it to it’s destination, only to find the deal had fell through. So he took it with him when he went to a bar that evening… and the worst happened – he lost it.

He is currently being sued by the paintings owner for the loss of the painting.

Trust is very important when dealing with your courier, you have to trust that they will do as they say and you have to trust that they will deliver your consignments and they know what to do if the consignment is not accepted at the point of delivery.

So how do you know if your courier is trustworthy?

  • How visible are they?
  • How easily contactable are they?
  • Do they have testimonials?
  • Can you contact customers who have used them?
  • Do they communicate effectively with their customers and listen to feed back?
  • Do they have insurance and can you see the documents?

You may have noticed to the right of this post we have a few trucks with names on – LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. You can contact us in a number of ways and join us on these sites as well as emailing or calling us. We are highly visible couriers who are dead easy to contact. That’s not to say your courier isn’t trustworthy because they are not on these sites; the more time and effort a courier puts into their presence online and offline will give you a clear indication of how long they are staying in business, how big their business is and who in their company you can contact.

We are open and transparent, as much as a business can be. We even sell guides to becoming a courier, so our business ‘secrets’ are in the public domain. You can see on sites like LinkedIn who has endorsed our services as well as testimonials on this blog. It’s all there if you do your research.

Ask around on forums, twitter and Facebook and get people to tell you who they use and who they value – often they are different companies.

Now here is the crux of the matter – what research did you do when booking your courier service? How did you select them? How do you know they are trustworthy? or did you just book and hope?

You can cut corners in business, but as the owner of the painting found, couriers are not an area in which to do that. Without research and conversations, you will never know how trustworthy your courier is. That can cost you dearly.

Sarah

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Where do you get your courier service advice from?

December 28, 2009 By

Many will ask about courier services in forums and Sarah is a lover of forums. Lately she has taken to griping about them, she says they have all gone down hill and the advice is rubbish. I think she needs to take a little break from them for a while and write a few blogs :-) ;-)

One thread she showed me was very interesting. The original poster asked about a central London delivery service for a fresh fruit based product that was extremely fragile. Lots of advice was given on what parcel courier to use. If the commenters read the original post, they would have seen that there were mentions of ‘fragile’ and’ fresh fruit’  (which needed to be kept as fresh as possible), so it required same day delivery, possibly in a refrigerated vehicle.

There were plenty of suggestions that certain parcel companies should be used as they were ‘cheap’ but if the commenters understood parcels and courier work or  had bothered to read the parcel carriers small print, they would have seen that parcel companies are not allowed to transport food or liquids…

I don’t know if the person resolved the issue, I do know we left some excellent advice as always but it was buried amongst ‘cheap parcel’ offers, which is disapointing for the person needing advice, and for the parcel couriers who would have to turn them away.

So where can you get good advice of how to deliver/courier certain items?

You can search this blog, over the last 18 months we have added heaps of posts about how to move certain items.

Our  same day courier Facebook fan page – here we welcome questions and offer tips for packing and parcel courier discounts. I also post up transport news and links to greener delivery, and topical issues with a transport slant.

On twitter – Sarah happily answers questions – she is @essex_courier I am @freight_rescue but I am not on twitter as often as Sarah is, so she should be your first tweet.

You can pick up the phone and talk to me 0800 9177084 and I’ll help you, and if we can’t, then we always know someone who can.

And you can continue to ask in forums, but remember, they may not read your original post correctly, so try to be as clear as possible.

Regards

Kevin

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