COVID-19 challenges. Online orders are currently taking longer to process, ship, and arrive, which means delivery issues or delays have become more common. If the reasons for delays are unreasonable, it may be time to consider a change in fulfillment providers or shipping methods. Otherwise, there’s not much retailers can do besides tracking orders better, spotting disruptions, and informing customers. But some transparency goes a long way: Retailers are opting to put COVID-19 notices wherever applicable on their websites, such as homepages, shopping carts, shipping pages, and product pages. This, along with listing a conspicuous COVID-19 estimated delivery date (EDD) for orders, encourages 75.1% of shoppers to go ahead with a purchase.
E-commerce fulfillment is the series of steps an order goes through from the moment a customer places an order online until that order is delivered to its final destination. These steps include receiving, processing, selecting, packaging, and shipping (transporting) orders. Depending on the size of a business (among other factors), a business may choose to handle e-commerce fulfillment in-house or use a fulfillment center or provider.