On time, every time

Even in these price-conscious times, people pay a 40 percent premium to Blue Dart to courier their letters and packages across the country

Blue Dart, one of South Asia's leading courier and integrated air express package distribution companies charges a 40 percent premium for its services and boasts of more than 100,000 shipments per day.
"Effective implementation of technology is the primary reason behind the phenomenal success that Blue Dart enjoys today," explains Malcom Monteiro, senior vice president-sales, services and systems, Blue Dart.

Dart 's package

Since its inception in 1983, Blue Dart has invested more than Rs 40 crore in technology development. It offers its services across 13,600 locations. Multiply this with the plethora of product offerings that the company has and the logistics involved is, simply put, extremely complex. It has set up certain internal standards, termed net service level (NSL), for measuring performance. The company claims that on an average it has managed to maintain its NSL at 99.95 percent constantly. The main factor here is that every product offering from the company integrates technology, right from an indigenously developed ERP system to a space management system to Web technologies.
Other tools that enable real-time, online as well as wireless tracking of every single shipment include TrackDart, which can be accessed by logging on to the company's website. It enables the customer to find the status of a shipment. MailDart on the other hand allows tracking of shipments using e-mail and MobileDart tracks delivery status by using either the short messaging service (SMS) option or WAP. Other products include PackTrack, InternetDart, ShopDart, ImageDart and ShipDart. While ShopDart tracks purchases made online, ImageDart provides the delivery receipt online.
Blue Dart has taken various measures to ensure transparency, right from procurement to package delivery. Blue Dart's indigenously developed ERP system, Cosmat 2 (short for computerised online system for management) enables tracking of shipments right from pick-up to various transit points, till delivery.

Hub and spokes

Data is captured right at the point of transaction and then stored centrally. The decentralised capture of data at various points is done on Novell NetWare servers. This in turn allows easy access to data over a WAN, and ensures real- time access to information. According to Monteiro, the current average lead time from the capture of data to the time it is made available to the customer is under 10 minutes. The company has set up nine hubs throughout the country. The central database is located in Mumbai, and all the hubs update the database here.
Blue Dart has developed a space management system, christened Smart, to enable customers to book space online. Smart (space management allocation reservation and transfer) is a centralised application that allows real-time space and revenue management on the Blue Dart Aviation network.

Benefits

Today, 97 percent of Blue Dart's sales are directly connected to the WAN. The remaining 3 percent situated in small locations utilise the Internet to forward transaction information. The company ensures that the data is uploaded onto a central server in the shortest possible time.
Cosmat 2 also interfaces with the company's human resources management, financial management, purchases, sales monitoring, executive systems and CRM systems. In order to enable all Blue Dart alliances and locations to interface with the system, the company has designed an application called Sentor. This system enables faster updates and feedback via the Internet. The system also features an in-built monitoring mechanism to check delivery performance.
Thanks to the 'Smart' system, customers can book space on the aircraft and get an assurance that the package will be on the flight. Smart is connected to Comsat 2 in order to enables trace and track.
Shield, BlueDart's online security module, has been integrated with Caress, the company's customer complaint and appreciation module. Monteiro feels this is the key reason why 90 percent of the credit card business is handled by Blue Dart. The system allows any employee to log in any area of concern. The information is the forwarded to the 'trackers cell', which studies the issue. If there is any cause for concern the matter is handed over to the security team for investigation.
Technology has enabled Blue Dart to improve the quality of decisions taken, highlight areas of concern, issue prompt service delay notification (SDN) alerts to customers, save on costs, improve efficiency and reduce time spent on various processes.
According to Monteiro retention of customers is something technology has helped them to maintain. H cites instances where customers who had switched to a cheaper service provider came back after realising the benefits provided by Blue Dart.