On 03/08/15 12:56, Chris Walker wrote:
I'd be interested to know how companies such as DPD do it as they can quote an approximate delivery time and the customer can check online where that delivery vehicle is. That suggests that their delivery route is mapped before the driver leaves the depot whereas when I was a transport manager, the maxim was always to attempt delivery on the address furthest away from the depot first so that you were always working towards your home base. That was a very long time ago now though and sat navs were things that only appeared in James Bond films ;-)
IME their satnavs are no better than pot-boiling models: the drivers are often pretty gormless too. When walking, on numerous occasions I have been passed and repassed, and re-repassed by delivery drivers, often looking at all the names/numbers they drive by.
*Never* do they consider asking a mere local to give them directions. How would a local know better than a delivery-driver?
Sometimes, in a fit of desperation one will stop and ask (but only after Operation Yo-Yo has been exhausted). One such asked me where Oak Farm was. It was at the bottom of the loke next to my house, so I told him.
He returned up the loke a few minutes later saying that the gates were locked. I said that they would be out, then, and he could leave the parcel with me and I would sign for it. The 'parcel' was two pallets of Red Bull, and I couldn't think what they'd want that for: still, they were unloaded and parked out of the way.
Then I thought: "Oak Farm, or Oaks Farm?" Driver looked on his delivery note. "Oaks Farm." <lightbulb moment>
Bunwell, or Carleton Rode? </lightbulb>
<delivery note> "Carleton Rode." </note>
The pallets were reloaded and off he went to Oaks Farm, some ⅞ mile away - in the next village...
What price satnavs?