Make delivery promises you can keep

"Delivery within 30 minutes!" It looks great on the board outside your shop. Then Saturday evening comes, twelve orders arrive together, and half of them are late. Every late order is a customer who remembers the promise and the miss.

Customers rarely complain about waiting. They complain about being told one thing and getting another. A promise you keep, even a slow one, earns more trust than a fast one you break.

This guide shows how to make promises that fit your shop, and how to keep them on busy days.

Why "within 30 minutes" backfires#

A fixed promise works only when everything goes right: the order is ready, a rider is free, the road is clear. One slow day breaks it, and your customers do not remember the 20 good days, only the one miss.

• It fails on your busiest days, exactly when customers are watching most closely.

• It forces your staff to rush, so packing mistakes go up.

• It sends riders out with single orders to beat the clock, which costs more per delivery.

• It leaves no room for a customer who is not at home.

Promise a delivery window instead#

A window says "your order will arrive between 5 and 6 pm". It is easy for the customer to plan around and easy for you to keep, because you can group the orders for the same window into planned trips.

Start with windows that are a little wider than you think you need. It is much better to arrive early in a window than late in a short one. After a month, look at how many orders met their window, and tighten it only if you are always early.

MiniDrop plans trips around how many orders a rider can carry. If a customer asks for something faster than usual, you can set a delivery priority for that order on the Dispatch page, so it is planned with that in mind. Leave everything else as normal.

Set a cut-off for each window#

A cut-off is the last time you take an order for a window. If the 5 to 6 pm window closes at 3:30, the staff have time to pack, and the rider has time to be ready. Orders after 3:30 go into the next window.

Write the cut-offs where customers see them: on your menu, your WhatsApp status or the board in the shop. Then keep to them. A cut-off that is sometimes broken is not a cut-off.

The times above are only an example. Choose times based on how long your own packing takes.

Match your dispatch schedule to your windows#

When windows are fixed, you do not need to plan trips all day. Plan them once, shortly before each window. In MiniDrop, you can put dispatch on a schedule with fixed times of day, for example 10 minutes before each window starts. The waiting orders are planned together into trips, and you approve the routes.

If you take orders all day and promise a quick delivery, a schedule that runs every 15 or 30 minutes is a better fit. The guide to automatic dispatch helps you choose.

When you will be late, tell the customer early#

Things go wrong. A rider has a puncture, the road is blocked, a big order takes longer to pack. What matters is that the customer hears it from you first.

• Call or message the customer as soon as you know. "Your order will be 20 minutes late. Sorry!" takes ten seconds.

• Keep the tracking link shared so they can see where the rider is.

• Give a new time you can keep, not the one you hope for.

Frequently asked questions#

Choose your windows and cut-offs this week, put them where customers can see them and keep them for a month.

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