GFS and P2P to offer ‘greater shipment visibility’

Parcel and carrier manager GFS has joined forces with mail solutions provider P2P Mailing to launch a unique new product, Trak Pak, which they claim will cut costs for internet retailers and increase visibility in shipments.

Traditionally, eSellers sending low value items to foreign customers via a standard service have either had to rely on international packet post with limited or no tracking, or premium express parcel services which offer tracking but add to delivery costs.

Neil Cotty, GFS’s managing director, said Trak Pak had the capability of increasing the appeal of cross-border commerce for consumers and the businesses with which they shopped without increasing prices.

The growth of e-commerce has increased the choice of product available to consumers and the geographical range of retailers from which they can buy.

Millions of less bulky or lower value items, including clothing, books and CDs, are sent to their doors each year as packets or small parcels.

“What Trak Pak represents is a combination of P2P’s expertise in providing international mail delivery solutions and GFS’s speciality in providing a multi-carrier management platform to deliver a fully integrated and tracked service,” said Cotty.

The launch of Trak Pak comes as the European Commission is stepping up efforts to tackle obstacles that limit the volume of cross-border e-commerce trade.

A recent report submitted to the Commission’s head of online and postal services, Werner Stengg, concluded that both internet retailers and consumers lost out because the cost of sending parcels and packets between European countries was “too high”.

P2P’s managing director, Paul Galpin, said Trak Pak would be able to deliver packages weighing typically up to 5kgs throughout Europe, North America, Australasia and the Far East in line with current priority mail schedules and with the added benefit of track and trace.

“What we are able to offer is lower costs to the retailer and increased convenience and security of delivery for consumers, something which is at the heart of what e-commerce is all about,” he said.

“Together we will be able to inject items into domestic mail markets across the globe and track them in a way which no-one else is currently able to do.”