Is Contactless Delivery the New Normal?
Physical contact either direct or indirect has always been a part of a primary habit in humans. Whether it is as simple as handshaking, or handling things from one person to another or just a simple hug. But with the onset of this pandemic that has engulfed the whole world in its massive claws, we are seeing a bad side of this basic habit that’s quite hard to get rid of.
Despite its several precautions, indirect contact with people or handling the same things as an infected person has presented a new class of innovative methods to handle the present scenario. And that’s where the concept of contactless delivery got its genesis from.
Following this unique idea, let’s dive a little deeper into contactless delivery and how it has become the new normal in this post-pandemic world.
Unraveling Contactless Delivery
The name describes everything Contact +Less +Delivery in itself. As the simple meaning of this concept revolves around post-pandemic measures, it is a precaution to have no direct contact with employees, delivery partners, and customers. The main objective of this novel idea is safe to transport or deliver essential services in a safe and protected manner.
It also covers tasks like regular sanitization of the offices, equipment, warehouses, employees, delivery goods, and delivery partners. Another name for this concept is “No Contact Delivery” and “Zero Contact Delivery”.
Contactless delivery can be best described as a new and innovative delivery model catering to the present scenario with its popularity growing every second due to the strict social distancing regulations implemented by companies and governments all across the world.
Contactless delivery is a novel idea to make the delivery at the customer’s place as per their convenience. Unlike direct delivery where there is a high risk of coming in contact with an infected person, contactless delivery offers their customers services where contact with their hands is avoided, and also provides a safe service of delivering packages at a distance of at least 6 feet between the customer and the delivery person.
Contactless Delivery Process
Though many markets are adopting the contactless delivery concept in their way, the most impacted and accommodating market is none other than food delivery platforms. So, let’s take an example of a food delivery platform here.
Once a customer places an online order with a cashless payment mode online and till the delivery guy gets the order, all workplace safety precautions are taken while making the food. Then the delivery executive delivers the order at the customer’s doorstep or any place convenient place they suggest rather than knocking on the door. So, customers can also select their preferred area and the timing of the delivery. Then once arriving at the suggested drop place the delivery person notifies them either via text message, call, or even email about their respective order collection.
Forgoing an extra mile for their customer’s satisfaction, the health status of the particular delivery executives, as well as restaurant chefs, are also displayed on the customer’s side of the order tracking screen.
Perks of Contactless Delivery
Trust: With the normal lifestyle of every person coming to a halt, trust has become a non-negotiable priority. So, for the businesses to revitalize their trust in their customers again, many of them have gravitated towards zero contact delivery service.
Safety and Hygiene: The contactless delivery service is transforming the customer experience in these uncertain times to ensure customer’s 100% safety. In a nutshell, service providers have stepped up with their strict protocol implementations to minimize human contact, while also performing their duties such as using sanitizers as per necessary standards, routine health check-ups, and also giving training lessons to delivery agents.
Transparency: With the evolution of the new concept, new factors are slowly starting to come up in the business models like transparency. Service providers have slowly started to put more effort into their communication of company’s process like from order preparation to delivery, such as order confirmation, preparation, delivery agent’s arrival and leaving time, refunds, place of delivery among other things.
Driving Digital Payments: Though cashless payment has already made its mark in several markets, the present scenario has just made them the necessary mode of payments. It also shows businesses ensuring their customers that their respective payments are in safe hands. Utilizing this current trend of using cashless payment can also drastically improve cash flow, helps in identifying gaps in payment collection, and easing the audit processes.
Increasing Brand Loyalty: Another benefit that is coming up for this contactless delivery option is showing the loyalty of businesses to their customers. It also develops a brand-customer relationship that goes beyond cash backs, discounts and Black Friday sales. This is a great way to convince their customers that the business is willing to walk that extra mile to make them happy.
Future Outlook of Contactless Delivery
At a crucial time like this where the survival of many service providers was at stake, no contact food delivery made its entry as a savior. Contactless delivery has opened a new realm of endless possibilities not just in food service platforms but also in AI, Robotics wells as the Autonomous Vehicle market.
One of the innovative achievements of this service was seen when in San Francisco’s citywide coronavirus lockdown, aspiring drone racing pilot David Chen delivered a single roll of much-needed toilet paper to his friend Ian Chan in another part of the city and captured the video of the delivery made and posted it to his Twitter feed, that went viral.
And with many experiments going around the world in Robotics to act as front end helpers to patients or Tesla’s project of assembly-line robots that essentially construct other robots are among a few projects that, though under development, will surely break through the development stage to give a better contactless delivery experience soon.
