Communications of the ACM
E-services
E-Services at Fedex
Fedex, a leading global package delivery company, offers air express and ground shipping services. Since the emergence of the Internet and e-commerce, the corporation has evolved toward an information delivery business providing customers both traditional and newly developed online shipping support and information services to meet their needs.
FedEx Ship Manager (FSM), available from the U.S., Canada, and more than 72 countries worldwide, helps customers prepare airbill forms online. FedEx ShipAlert is an FSM tool that sends shipment notifications to inform recipients that a FedEx shipment has been delivered to them. The tool can also generate email notifications of successful deliveries back to the sender. In many countries, courier pickups can also be scheduled online. In addition to the shipping functions, FedEx online resources allow customers to review their shipping history and obtain rate quotes before processing shipments.
For information requests, the e-services engines take customer requests online, including the customer's request to schedule shipment pickups by day, time, and exact location, Supplies such as airbills, envelopes, and shipping boxes can also be handled online. In the case of routine merchandise returns, recipients can request a pickup for merchandise return via the Net.
Most customers may be familiar with the shipment tracking capabilities of the FedEx site, but not everyone realizes that customers are able to use the site to view and print the package recipient's handwritten signatures as proof of delivery. Shipping invoices can be rapidly reviewed, clarified, adjusted, and settled online.
This collection of e-services can be placed under one umbrella through the "My FedEx" e-service. My FedEx gives customers a user-specific view of fedex.com as it stores the customer's profile information, preferences, and up to 25 of the customer's tracking numbers. In this interface, a Track Inbox provides quick shipping status updates each time the customer logs in or refreshes the page. My FedEx also allows customers to customize the services they use most, such as Track My Packages, Ship My Packages, Ship Links, and customer-specific My Links.
General purpose e-services are also provided to the general public with no login requirements; integrating e-services with e-commerce applications such as shipping information, package tracking, and rate inquiries. The Rate Finder service provides rates for locations and package-size combinations. FedEx rates are organized by zones, which are based on the distance between an origin and a shipment's destination. A FedEx Zone Locator chart lists the zone for any shipment a customer sends within the U.S. Find FedEx Locations provides a view of the Zone Locator chart specific to the customer's origin location by zip code. Drop-off service finds the FedEx locations associated with the customer's street address, city, state, zip code, and telephone number. FedEx Ground Service Maps provide color-coded maps that guide estimates of shipping times related to different shipping destinations, based on origination zip codes.
International shipments and shipping services, more complex than domestic services, now include Global Trade Manager (GTM)a unique, comprehensive resource providing tools, news, and information designed to make international shipping and logistics easier to accomplish. GTM supports complex international shipping tasks, including identifying, locating, and obtaining recommended documents for international shipment, and preshipment determinations of duties and taxes to be levied against a shipment. GTM currently supports export/import for over 22 countries in Asia, Latin America, Europe, and North America. GTM's online International Resource Center provides a News Center with daily international news updates, a searchable archive of international, regional, and trade-related news stories, and an extensive library of downloadable international trade documents.
E-Service Features
FedEx e-services are designed for ease of use, to provide high scalability, and consistent availability. Several advanced features are also provided:
Fulfillment. E-services can be composed to achieve a specific objective. For example, an international shipment need not only rate quotes and printed shipping labels, but also transit times, and duty and tax information. All of these services are tied together at the FedEx site to fulfill the customer's shipping request.
Integration. E-services are seamlessly integrated with e-commerce applications to make the shipping experience simple and convenient. Site integration makes it possible for customers to transit from one application to another, or from an application to a service, by simply clicking the mouse. In the integration process, FedEx legacy data is melded with contemporary information to promote best service quality.
My FedEx gives customers a user-specific view of fedex.com as it stores the customer's profile information, preferences, and up to 25 of the customer's tracking numbers.
Interaction. Each e-service interacts with others to fulfill customer requests. For example, rate quote services interact with transit time determinations to provide accurate rate information.
Customization. Customers can tailor their account to fit their preferences and needs, so the site recalls and updates common routines and shipping information, automatically refreshes recent shipment information, and proactively remembers customers' routine activities.
Self-service. The site's self-service capabilities allow customers to review accounts, monitor shipments, edit profiles, schedule pickups, adjust invoices, return merchandise, and so forth, as computer-mediated rather than interpersonal transactions.
Search engine. A knowledge-base search engine provides multiple search methods such as FAQs, full-text search, case-based reasoning, and decision trees.
Flexibility. The open IT infrastructure is adaptable in dynamic environments. It provides recommendations, notifies customers with new applicable discount deals, and adds new or removes old services.
Automatic response. An automated email response management system automatically responds to emailed questions from customers.
Summary
Customer satisfaction and service quality are vital to any organization's success in the Internet age. As a provider of valuable information services, FedEx has harnessed the Internet by developing and providing a wide spectrum of e-services to meet its customers' ever-growing needs. The company benefits from this service development and interactive provision process by being able to understand its customers better, which leads to more attuned delivery efforts. As a result, the company meets customer expectations and improves customer experiences, thus building loyalty and achieving customer retention.
©2003 ACM 0002-0782/03/0600 $5.00
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