RED STAR BOOSTS E-COMMERCE WITH SADDLE

A first of its kind industry solution to manage “Pay-On-Delivery” transactions for online businesses and e-transactions has been deployed by Red Star Plc, a leading courier and logistics organization with decades of service delivery experience.

The application, known as “Saddle”, allows instant payment on delivery reconciliation, enable customers monitor and track the movement of ordered products until items are delivered and at the same time, allows e-platforms/partner companies to seamlessly receive notifications when orders are placed.

According to Jayson Oyarekhua, Head, Projects and New Ventures, Red Star Plc, the application has been customized in such a way that it enables organizations especially those in e-commerce, track orders from clients, monitor activities prior to delivery and generate report after delivery or as at when due. "The application will enable a transparent solution on all sides of the e-commerce chain; Red Star Express PLC, the E-commerce platform and the end user who ordered the product”.

Jayson disclosed that subscribing to the Saddle application will provide several features that will be beneficial to e-Commerce platforms across the country. "The features are meant to change the way e-tailing is executed; it will impact on logistics management tool, provides cash and card payment solution, it will act as front-end app for delivery agents, back-end tool for dispatch, monitoring and reconciliation, provide pick-up and drop-off tools, provide tracking information for consumers and provide industry solution for multiple e-commerce sites/platforms”.

This solution is flexible enough to suit individual business models. The application could be customized to fit the business need of the back end user of this product. “And the good thing about it is that the storage of the massive information is absolutely free because it is stored in the cloud".

Explaining how it works, Jayson said a customer (an e-commerce Platform provider) receives an API to integrate Saddle into their website. Once integration is done, the customer will have visibility to the Saddle logistics management. When an order is made on their platforms, the transaction is sent and logged in Saddle where it becomes available for pick-up and delivery. For delivery, Saddle will be linked to a mobile POS solution which every delivery agent can use to receive payment upon delivery. Payment (cash, card) will be logged into the account of the merchant with proper reconciliation and settlement process in place.

"The app starts with the integration of an e-commerce website. So when an order is ready to be fulfilled, the e-commerce website feeds into saddle and the Logistics partner will be able to see orders that are ready to be picked up. This solution will significantly organize the current e-commerce delivery process by assigning pick-ups to agents within a certain geographical location. For example, when an agent needs to pick up from merchants located in Victoria Island. The algorithm built into it will assign the pick-up info to agents in Victoria Island. So this app puts sanity to an otherwise chaotic system that is currently in place. The MPOS allows the customer the ability to pay on delivery. By integrating MPOS with Saddle, it creates a real time payment notification".

The customer is able to see when their order has been picked up from the merchant. Then the order is tracked from when it gets on the vehicle until the last mile customer signs that the order has been received. Dates at various touch points progression are visible. Daily, weekly or monthly report can be generated for reconciliation purposes.