E-commerce delivery up during festival season for Postal Department

COIMBATORE, October 16, 2016

Its festival season, its shopping time - both, online and offline. With more customers turning to portals to book gifts, buy articles, agencies that deliver these parcels to customers make special arrangements for the season so that the shoppers get the goods well before Deepavali.

In the recent years, Postal Department is handling delivery for several e-commerce firms.

It has partnered with portals such as Snapdeal, Amazon.in, Myntra, Shopping Zone, and Naaptol and has a special tie-up with Amazon.in for same day delivery in Coimbatore.

According to Postmaster General, Western Region, Sharda Sampath, apart from transport by rail, the department has strengthened its road transport network. Road transport from Coimbatore to Madurai via Dindigul, to Chennai via Salem, to Bengaluru via Hosur, and between Hosur-Krishnagiri-Jolarpettai and Dharmapuri-Salem helps move the goods to the respective post offices soon.

While Cash on Delivery parcels are handled by the postmen in the morning hours, the other parcels are delivered on Sundays and holidays too and it is outsourced.

Some of the post offices that handle high volume of e-commerce parcels in the region are Coimbatore Head Post Office, RS Puram Head Post Office, Coimbatore Central, Ramanathapuram, Peelamedu, Salem Head Post Office, Suramangalam Head Post office and Hasthampatti post office.

While same day delivery is high within the city, the other e-commerce bookings are even for delivery in rural areas.

The articles are delivered through Speed Post, Business Parcel, and Express Parcel.

Last year, e-commerce business through Speed Post in the region was to the tune of Rs. 28 lakh during festival season and this year, it has already crossed Rs. 12 lakh.

“We expect a surge in volume of parcels from the e-commerce sector during this season,” she says.

Source : http://www.thehindu.com