Takealot's big boxing problem

Supervan II said:
LOL. Have you ever been inside an efficiently run warehouse?

This is BS - that's no reason and it's not a reasonable excuse for overuse of boxes.

Every warehouse will run efficiently if similar products/items are grouped together so that argument does not hold water. The problem here is inefficient utilisation of staff (pickers) or a broken system - more likely both.
Pickers are running to- and fro- between getting their (single line) orders picked and then packed & labelled, then rinse & repeat for the next (single line) order, and so on and so on! This just wastes time, effort and packaging/courier costs.

Why not do what every warehouse does and issue each picker a number of complete picking slips/orders at the same time? Then the same picker picks, packs & labels the carton/s once invoiced?

Methinks that their system is fooked and the single line items are being given to the pickers to be picked sequentially, for some obscure reason. I have worked with a few different Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) and my bet is that they are using SAP *spits*.
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That's what I was told by a Takealot employee, if you order a shirt and a pen and they are on opposite sides of their warehouse they will rather ship them in two boxes. And it's further complicated by some areas being isolated to combat stock shrinkage which was apparently rampant at one stage, pickers don't have access to all areas and goods from the secure areas are shipped on their own.

Takealot couldn't possibly be shooting themselves in the foot to the degree you are claiming, that pickers would be perfectly capable of consolidating orders but the system is not designed that way and hence they pick and ship single line items instead of the full order.
 
HumanShield said:
Drivers get paid per box delivered. So if they have a deal with the packers. Then why not create many boxes for multiple items.
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That's an interesting point, drivers get paid around R10-R15 per delivery, surely Takealot will only pay one fee per delivery instance even if it's multiple boxes but considering how each box seems to have it’s own waybill and shipment info I wonder how they work that out.
 
airborne said:
That's an interesting point, drivers get paid around R10-R15 per delivery, surely Takealot will only pay one fee per delivery instance even if it's multiple boxes but considering how each box seems to have it’s own waybill and shipment info I wonder how they work that out.
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One driver i spoke to said he gets 7 ronts for a small box and 15 ronts for a big box. That's why their cars are loaded to the hilt with boxes.
 
1am7h30n3 said:
What's in the 3rd box?
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Schrödinger's cat!

airborne said:
That's what I was told by a Takealot employee, if you order a shirt and a pen and they are on opposite sides of their warehouse they will rather ship them in two boxes. And it's further complicated by some areas being isolated to combat stock shrinkage which was apparently rampant at one stage, pickers don't have access to all areas and goods from the secure areas are shipped on their own.

Takealot couldn't possibly be shooting themselves in the foot to the degree you are claiming, that pickers would be perfectly capable of consolidating orders but the system is not designed that way and hence they pick and ship single line items instead of the full order.
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They are shooting themselves - in BOTH FEET! 🤣 🤣🤣

No wonder they' re not making any money! They're wasting it on inefficiencies and multiple packages which cost money.

Perhaps they should forego their B-BBEEE ideals and hire a proper warehouse manager!
 
Bliksis said:
So, it's either about the actual weight, and if the package is 200g, they use the volumetric weight?
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Don't know what you mean by 200g. But it's L x W x H x X.XXX and if the volumetric weight is more than the actual weight you pay according to that. Usually doesn't matter for small and light fixed weight parcels as there's already a margin but it's to prevent someone from sending a shipload of say polystyrene pellets at a super cheap rate as it costs just as much as something heavier that takes up the space.
 
Bliksis said:
So, it's either about the actual weight, and if the package is 200g, they use the volumetric weight?
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It's all about the weight of the parcel AND the volumetric ratio you will be charged at, see example below.

Swa said:
Don't know what you mean by 200g. But it's L x W x H x X.XXX and if the volumetric weight is more than the actual weight you pay according to that. Usually doesn't matter for small and light fixed weight parcels as there's already a margin but it's to prevent someone from sending a shipload of say polystyrene pellets at a super cheap rate as it costs just as much as something heavier that takes up the space.
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Correct! In very simple terms:

ROADFREIGHT
A typical volumetric rate for freight by road is 5000:
Say the charge for that rate is @ R10/kg

Then an item with the dimensions 20cm x 20cm x 20cm / 5000 = 1.6kg
@ R10/kg you will be charged R10.60.

This means that this item (of this particular size) has to have a maximum mass of 1.6 kg. to be charged R 10.60

Should the item weigh less, you will still pay the minimum charge of R10.60.
Should it weigh 2.5kg (more than 1.6kg) you will pay per kg, IOW R20.50

AIRFREIGHT:
A typical volumetric rate for freight by air is 3000:
Say the charge for that rate is @ R10/kg

Then an item with the dimensions 20cm x 20cm x 20cm / 3000 = 1.6kg
@ R10/kg you will be charged R10.60.

This means that this item (of this particular size) has to have a maximum mass of 1.6 kg. to be charged R 10.60

Should the item weigh less, you will still pay the minimum charge of R10.60.
Should it weigh 2.5kg (more than 1.6kg) you will pay per kg, IOW R20.50
 
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Swa said:
Don't know what you mean by 200g. But it's L x W x H x X.XXX and if the volumetric weight is more than the actual weight you pay according to that. Usually doesn't matter for small and light fixed weight parcels as there's already a margin but it's to prevent someone from sending a shipload of say polystyrene pellets at a super cheap rate as it costs just as much as something heavier that takes up the space.
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How does the 200g not make sense. What if I ordered some razorblades,and they weigh 200g. What is not to understand
 
Bliksis said:
How does the 200g not make sense. What if I ordered some razorblades,and they weigh 200g. What is not to understand
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200g falls within the minimum weight of 1kg which is already higher than the per kg weight. There is a maximum size that applies for sub 1kg (in some cases 2kg) parcels for which you pay per kg if you exceed it. In most cases it doesn't matter and it's only if something is rather light but also takes up a lot of space.

It's not about the item being light or not but how much space it takes up relative to its weight.
 
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