How to Improve Order Accuracy? – Top 10 Effective Ways to Follow

One of the biggest problems in the modern world that plagues delivery businesses is declining order accuracy. With a low order accuracy percentage, you risk losing out on new customers and opportunities to save a lot of money. 

Seeing how it can potentially limit the profitability and scale of your business is honestly frightening. When businesses realize how much wrong orders cost them, they immediately rush to find the perfect solution to resolve the problems that affect their order accuracy.

A single wrong order can mean the difference between success and failure for many businesses that are just starting out. To address this issue, we will not only get into the methods that you can follow to improve order accuracy but also understand what it even is.

What is Order Accuracy and its Importance?

When distilled into its purest meaning, order accuracy simply refers to the levels of accuracy achieved by businesses when delivering orders to their customers. However, this oversimplified meaning leaves a lot of room for ambiguity and does not account for the nuances of different enterprises, order issues, and order types.

An issue that causes a drop in your order accuracy can be anything like a damaged product, wrong order quantity, wrong product, or delivery delay. While there are ways in which you can mitigate such issues, it is still best to have greater knowledge about the field of order accuracy. 

Importance of order accuracy

Having great accuracy in your fulfillment operations can be highly rewarding especially if you are in the initial stages of your business journey. This is because good order accuracy builds trust in the minds of new customers that may be weary of buying your product. 

Calculating OA can also be beneficial if you wish to refine the picking and packing process to save costs and boost profits. All in all, when you find ways to improve your order accuracy it leads to an overall better business experience for you and your customers.

How to calculate order accuracy?

The formula to calculate order accuracy is easier than almost any other formulae that are used by delivery businesses such as the EOQ formula or MOQ formula. This is because to measure the order accuracy rate you simply have to derive the percentage of successful orders.

The higher your order accuracy, the better your customer satisfaction usually is, as there are relatively fewer issues that they have to deal with when it comes to delivery. Ideally, your order accuracy should be in the high 90s. However, if it is dropping below 95%, then you have a reason for concern.

Top 10 Ways to Get Better Order Delivery Accuracy 

There are several ways to improve order accuracy that are usually tightly guarded sectors for most companies. Though frankly all of these methods are just various ways for your staff to be more diligent through the entire fulfillment process. 

1. Evaluating current bottlenecks 

The first step when solving any given problem is to understand the causes behind the problem. This is done to fully comprehend the scope of what you will be doing and how exactly you will go about it. It will also help you see if you have a competitive disadvantage.

Starting with the process of evaluation gives you an idea of the urgency of the situation allowing you to estimate how critical the situation is. This helps you understand the magnitude of operations that you will have to conduct to increase the number of accurate orders.

2. Accounting for road conditions

One of the biggest mistakes made by dispatchers or fleet managers is not accounting for road conditions that may affect delivery times. Overlooking these conditions can cause unexpected delays which put more stress on the driver and annoy the customer simultaneously.

Road conditions do not specifically have to be weather conditions as other factors such as the peak holiday season can affect how much time the drivers spend on the road. Taking into account these factors will give you a highly accurate estimate of when deliveries will be made.

3. Better labeling of goods

To prevent the unintentional swapping of products from the warehouse it is best to implement ways to better label the goods. There are many ways in which you could do this, however one way that has gained traction in the world of shipping is the use of barcodes to label goods.

Barcodes are excellent identifiers as they give complete information about any given product and are quick to scan and read. Such identifiers are also important for delivery drivers to identify the various packages that they carry in their delivery vehicles. 

4. Proper packaging of goods

One of the leading complaints concerning order accuracy is receiving damaged goods. There is nothing universally worse than waiting for days for a product only to receive it in a damaged condition. This often leads to highly negative customer perceptions of your brand. 

While there are ways in which you could prevent shipping damage, they all involve taking high responsibility and care when moving products. This means that both warehouses and drivers have to be extensively trained to handle packages in the safest manner possible.

5. Streamlining the distribution system

One of the biggest issues in a warehouse management system is inefficient procedures that make the most mundane tasks take hours of time. These issues are primarily caused by the poor arrangement of storage areas and transport pathways.

The best way to get started on your journey of optimizing your warehouse operations is by consulting a blog that exclusively addresses the complex issue of organizing a warehouse. The methods of warehouse optimization range from simple documentation to full automation. 

6. Automation of warehouse processes

The process of automating a fulfillment or distribution center is by no means easy or affordable. But it is undeniably the next step forward in the warehousing industry with the rising powers granted by automated processes that surpass the abilities of human operations. 

Automated processes are far less likely to process incorrect orders and cause delivery delays as they have very clear instructions and operation procedures. They also have no downtime like humans do making them even better suited to offer a superior customer experience. 

7. Integration of inventory management software

Keeping track of inventory is essential for any business in the modern day as it can make order processing errors occur more frequently. This especially holds true for Ecommerce businesses as they have to cater to a greater number of orders at much faster speeds.

The best way to keep track of your inventory is by using inventory management software as it gives you real-time information about your inventory. When you have live information about the entire inventory, you hold a position of greater judgment.

8. Driver training programs

When your drivers are trained to perfection, you not only reduce the chances of shipment damage but also greatly speed up the supply chain. This is because drivers are the entities that take the most time in the fulfillment supply chain. 

With faster deliveries, you can also get greater customer loyalty as they keep revisiting you for your speedy service. Though it is also important to understand your role in supplementing the performance of your drivers using dedicated software solutions that are purpose-built for such applications.

9. Route planning software

Route planning is unanimously considered one of the most strenuous and complicated tasks in supply chain management. Manual route planning leaves room for a swathe of logistical setbacks that can cost you hours of time and thousands of dollars of extra gas money. 

This is why it is best left to automated solutions that take care of all the heavy lifting that comes with manual route planning. There are many route planners in the market to choose from but the caveat is that you may get confused because of all the available options. 

10. Setting realistic targets

While productivity issues are very real, it is also crucial to acknowledge unreasonable targets that are very hard to accomplish. While promoting fast delivery times is good for building initial customer confidence, it leaves you vulnerable to poor order accuracy which is likely to destroy any credibility that you have built. 

Setting targets that are easily achievable can take a lot of burden off of your employees and improve customer retention and loyalty. It can also give you more time and freedom to make changes that actually boost speed holistically.

Now that you know how to increase your order accuracy, it’s time to go through some benefits in the next section. 

Benefits of Improved Order Accuracy

The negative effects of poor order accuracy are well documented and understood by many, but these effects are usually not enough to motivate change. So instead, we will look at three of the most prominent benefits that are enjoyed by companies that boast a high order accuracy rate.

1. Customer loyalty 

When you stay true to your guarantees of an accurate delivery date, your chances of improving customer retention spike by a hefty margin. Aside from the quality of your product the thing that customers expect the most is a satisfactory fulfillment experience. 

You must make customer service your top priority to achieve your fulfillment goals. Once given the best service possible, customers are likely to recommend your product or services to their circle which can grant your new business opportunities. 

2. Reduced operational costs

Apart from curbing the inherent cost to the company that is caused by incorrect orders, the procedures to fix order accuracy generally lower other costs as well. The best example of this is using a route planner as it saves you up to 40% on fuel costs. 

Solutions that increase operational efficiency enable you to conduct the same number of deliveries at drastically lower costs. You can also heavily cut down the costs spent on human labor with these methods of improving order accuracy. 

3. Operational speed

The speed bump that companies get when they implement methods of increasing delivery accuracy is very noticeable. This enhanced speed gives them a range of perks such as greater customer satisfaction and order capacity.

Because you can fit more deliveries in the same time frame with enhanced speed, you can basically level up your order capacity saving you both time and money. This is one of the more underrated benefits that is usually overlooked by businesses both large and small.

How Upper Helps Delivery Businesses Achieve Their Order Accuracy Goals

Upper is a state-of-the-art route planning solution that is trusted and used by many to plan their delivery routes on a daily basis. This is because Upper comes loaded with class-leading features that help businesses eliminate most order processing errors.

One such feature is the ability to give the drivers specific parcel information that tells them where a specific package is inside their vehicle to avoid any accidental mix-ups. You can also utilize the proof of delivery feature granted by Upper to guarantee a successful delivery. 

Couple these amazing features that prevent faulty orders with Upper’s highly optimized delivery routes and you have a solution that can truly revolutionize the delivery process. What Upper brings to the table is sheer brilliance that is essential for any business to have on its side.

Conclusion

Everything from the picking and packing process to the delivery process is prone to cause order inaccuracy. It is almost as if all the facets that are related to delivery operations are laden with pitfalls that hold the potential to ruin your order accuracy rate irrecoverably.

Alas, all is not lost as there are many measures that a business can take to curb almost all the issues that affect order accuracy. There are even dedicated software solutions that help businesses deal with these issues if they do not want to spend their time monitoring and being highly diligent throughout the delivery process. 

One such wondrous software solution is the Upper route planner as it not only helps businesses cut down on operational costs with highly efficient routes but also prevents loss of order accuracy with features like proof of delivery. So, what’s stopping you from trying Upper? Get a 7-day free trial.