A letter from Huntingdon to Milton

A LETTER FROM HUNTINGDON TO MILTON

               

  

At 1435 on Friday I prepared an important letter for Dr Chris Thomas of Milton Contact but I wanted to test the postal system as well so I inserted a Tracker from Vilant into the package.  The Vilant Tracker registers itself on the 3G cellular phone network so that if you interrogate the phone network provider they can tell you where the tracker has been.  The accuracy is within the coverage areas of particular cellular wireless masts (an accuracy of 1-2 km)

A few minutes after 1600 I went into the Post office on Huntingdon High Street, weighed the letter, bought a stamp and received a proof of posting from the counter clerk.  The Vilant Tracker has a App that I can use on my tablet and I was able to follow its journey to Cambridge almost in Real Time with a 1-2 hour delay.  

That evening at 1917 the letter arrived at the Werrington Sort Centre in Peterborough so I went to bed relatively confident that we were off and running.  Next morning when I was having a business breakfast with the Hunts Post business reporter at the Old bridge Hotel  I checked on the letters progress.  Hywel Barrett the reporter was most impressed.

The letter had arrived in Cambridge just after midnight and went out via Stow cum Quy for delivery at 0821. The final delivery through Chris's letter box was at 1015.  Now Chris is in Germany on business at the moment and will be arriving home on Saturday night. There is a light detector on the tracker so that when the letter is opened it will be detected by the tracking system. So I will know exactly where and when the letter has been opened.

This type of detailed and independent forensic analysis has never been possible before. There is no need for expensive infrastructure to be installed. Complex and interlocking distribution networks can be easily analysed, assured and improved - quickly and effectively.

Could this have been the first forensically tracked package in the UK providing total visibility within the normally opaque Royal mail's network. One obvious question is why the letter had to travel 80 miles when the direct distance is only 28 miles ?    18 hours to deliver compared with 30 minutes direct in the car !!  The service quality standard was certainly achieved - well done Post Office and Royal Mail but I think you will agree there is still some scope for optimisation the process and making it more efficient. 

A good challenge for the Post Office and the soon to be privatised Royal Mail