e-Commerce Logistivs: Basics

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e-Commerce Logistics: Basics
By
Zubin Poonawalla
Ever since E commerce retail started to boom in India, their major
need was fulfilling customer to get their order within very short
span of time, thereby making onlinetransactions a pleasant
experience. As a traditional transportation these small parcel’s
consolidation & distribution happensalong with other cargo goods &
this delayed order fulfillmentprocess.
In order to serveE commerce, CEP (courier Express& Parcel)
segment created time specific delivery services & thus Ecom-Delivery
Service Providers(ESP) came into picture.
The main purposeof Ecom Logistics is makingCustomersaround
Indiacan use the fast services & send their shipment anywhere in a
very short time.
Gojavas,Ecom Express,Delcart & Delhivery are some of the
famouscompaniesin India servingthis segment of E commerce
Retailers & EKart of Flipkart,ATS (AmazonTransportation
Service) ofAmazon catering their own
business. Basically Bikers are used in this business to effect the
deliveries. You can see many peoplewearingdifferentcoloursof
uniform movingaround thecity to deliver small parcels which are
up to 3 kgs.

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Wheel of E com Logistics
 First Mile
 Line haul
 Last MileDelivery(LMD)& COD collection
 Return to Origin (RTO)
 ReversePickup (RVP)
First Mile
Ecom Delivery Service Provider willsend their peopleto pick the
shipmentsfrom Ecom Retailer like Jabong, Snap deal, Flip kart’s
fulfilmentcentreor from their vendors. SometimesEcom Retailer
will send directly the shipments to the ESP’s Order Processing Centre
(OPC).
Here the received shipments processed by Barcodescanning, sorted
as per the destination city & bagging with seal has been done. Once
this processingis done& bags will moveto Airport/Railway Station
or loaded in Vehicles & moveto their destination through the next
process called- Line haul process.
Line Haul
Line haul meansMovementof cargo/Parcels between two or more
cities. This can be doneby variousmeans& methods.
 Movementof shipmentsfrom Origin to Destination directly (Direct
Service Network -Point to point network – mostly used by couriers)

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 Multi-stop Network ( Pickup & delivery pointsare linked in network-
Milk run)
 Hub& Spoke model – havingconnecting shipmentsto Centralized
HUB & consolidation & distribution to nearest Delivery Centres(DC).
Co-Loaders – who has service agreementwith Airlines; Railwaysare
providingservicesto these ESPs. Co-loadersresponsibility ends
once the shipmentsreached the destination (may be DC or Hub).
Last Mile Delivery & COD collection
The last mile is the last leg of shipment’s trip beforeit arriveson
Ecom retailer’s customer’s doorstep.
Here at the Delivery Centre(DC)- again Barcodescanningis done&
sorted as per the City Pin codes . The shipments are collected by
the Bikers which are associated with Pin codes & go for delivery.
Android phones for updatingStatus of the shipment& SMS –before
delivery & @ the time of Out For Delivery(OFD)& Track& Trace -
whole eventsright from Order despatch to Delivery created value
addition to customers & madethem to makerepeated online
transactions.
COD shipments-on delivery money are collected from the
customers& the money is deposited to the Ecom Retailer’s account
as per the agreed windowsof time. This processendsthe Last Mile
Delivery.
Returnto Origin
The traditionalshipment delivery processused to have 2 conditions
either Delivered or Undelivered. There is a third concept called
Return to Origin (RTO). This is mainly happensdueto customers

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(Receivers of Ecom companies)-rejecting the shipmentreceived &
asked for Money back.
As a process all the rejected / attempted but not delivered consumer
goods being collected & sent back to the Ecom Retailer’s fulfilment
centres again & handed over to them.
Reverse Pickup(RVP)
This is a uniqueprocessassociated with Ecom logistics where Ecom
Retailers are having a policy called Return which is being used to
make happy the end customers if he/she is not satisfied the products
received. Ecom Retailer’s Customer directly called or mailed the
Customer Service (CS), & registers the productto be returned.
On processingtheir requests, Ecom Retailer providesdatato ESPs to
collect from the cities requested. The requested ordersare picked up
& handed over to the Ecom Retailer.
Conclusion
Thus Ecom Logistics flourishes& ESPs keepson updatingtheir
technology as a cutting edge to penetrate the market& in which
whoever has the Best Technology & Operations winsthe race.
It is needlessto say that IT (Web services, Android phones, APP
based applications, Automated Sorters, Auto Weighing Machines,
SMS & IOTs) will give definite momentum in augmentingEcom
Logistics….