A missed delivery is the most expensive kind of delivery. You pay for the trip that achieved nothing, you pay again to redo it, and somewhere in between a customer contacts support to ask where their order went. The courier usually takes the blame, but the cause tends to sit much earlier in the process: in the address field, in the checkout form, in a delivery promise nobody checked against how the customer actually lives.
This guide sorts the common causes by who can actually fix them, covers the three pieces of information that prevent most misses, explains how to settle your retry rule before you need it, and suggests what to tell the customer at each stage.
Where missed deliveries really come from
Drivers are blamed for failed attempts more often than they cause them. Go through the usual reasons one at a time and the fix mostly belongs to whoever collects the order, not whoever carries it.
| Cause | What it looks like at the door | Who can fix it, and how |
|---|---|---|
| Nobody to receive it | The customer is at work and the order needs a hand-off. | Retailer and customer. Offer a window the customer picked, and say up front whether leave-at-door is allowed. |
| Access problem | An unlabelled buzzer, no door code, or a fob-only entrance. | Retailer. Add a dedicated entry-instructions field to checkout instead of a generic notes box. |
| Incomplete or misread address | The unit number is missing, or the driver is at the wrong building. | Retailer. Collect the unit separately and rebuild the label from the parts. |
| Unreachable customer | The phone number is a landline, a typo, or an old number. | Retailer. Ask for a mobile number that can receive texts, and validate the format. |
| Change of plans | The customer asks the driver to come back at 7 or to go to another address. | Retailer. Give customers a self-serve change link with a clear cutoff. |
| Item problem | Damaged, wrong, or refused after inspection. | Retailer. Photograph the order at pack-out so the drop-off photo has something to be compared with. |
Three things to capture before the order ships
Nearly every cause above can be shrunk by collecting three things at checkout. None of them require new software, only better questions.
- A clean address, with the unit in its own field.In Québec the unit number is often written ahead of the street number, joined by a hyphen: 3-1234 rue Saint-Denis means apartment 3 at civic number 1234. A form or label printer that expects the unit after the street can drop it altogether, or read "3-1234" as the building number. Collect the unit as its own field and rebuild the label from the parts. Keep the municipality and postal code too, since rue Principale exists in nearly every town around Montréal.
- Entry instructions the driver can actually use.Door code, the name that appears on the buzzer (not always the customer's name), the floor, and whether there is a concierge or a fob entrance. Make this a labelled field with an example in it, such as "Buzzer: Tremblay. Code: 4417. Ring twice." A general order-notes box mostly collects gift messages.
- A way to reach the customer, and a hand-off rule.A mobile number that can receive texts, plus a clear answer to one question: may the driver leave this at the door, with a neighbour, with a concierge, or only with the named recipient? For gifts and higher-value orders the safe default is the named recipient, or someone they have named.
Give the customer a window they can plan around
A tracking link tells a customer where the driver is. A window tells them whether to stay home. A customer who is told the order arrives between 2 and 4 can arrange for someone to be there. A customer who is told "between 9 and 5" has been told nothing useful and will be out.
Narrow windows are only worth promising if the route behind them is built around them, which is why the delivery window is set when the route is planned, not after the order has shipped. If you run a mix of urgent and recurring orders, same-day versus scheduled delivery explains how the two usually fit together, and how to set a cutoff time covers the other half of the promise.
Decide the retry rule before the first miss
Sooner or later a first attempt will fail anyway. What happens next should be a rule you chose in advance, not a negotiation that starts over with every order. Four rules cover most situations.
| Rule | How it works | Best for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Same-day second attempt | The driver passes the address again later on the same route, or on an evening pass. | Flowers, perishable items, gifts tied to a date. | It costs a second stop and only works if the customer can be reached quickly. |
| Next-route retry | The order rides along on the next scheduled route. | Standard parcels with no deadline. | The customer waits a day or more, so a message matters. |
| Customer-chosen redelivery | The customer picks a new window or address from a link. | Higher-value orders, customers who travel. | Needs a cutoff, or the same order can bounce repeatedly. |
| Return after two misses | After a second miss the order comes back to you. | Time-critical or perishable goods whose value expires. | You need a refund and restock process ready, and the customer should be warned before it happens. |
Whichever rule you choose, tell your courier when you set up the account. On a last-mile delivery service the missed attempt is flagged and handled the way you specified, so the instruction has to exist before the first miss. If your current courier never asked which rule you wanted, that is worth raising; it is one of the questions to ask a local courier partner before committing.
What to tell the customer, and when
Customers are far more forgiving of a miss they heard about within minutes than one they discovered on the porch. Three short messages cover the whole story:
- Before the visit. "Your order is on its way and is expected between 2 and 4 p.m. Track it here." This is the message that gets someone home.
- Right after a miss. What happened, what it costs the customer (nothing, if that is your policy), and one thing to do: "We couldn't deliver your order today because nobody answered at the door. Choose a new time or tell us where to leave it." Send it as soon as the attempt is logged.
- After it is resolved. A confirmation with the drop-off photo, so the customer sees how the story ended.
In Québec those messages need to reach people in the language they read. Bilingual delivery notifications covers how to capture a language preference and keep the wording consistent in both languages.
Measure the right number
The headline figure is first-attempt success: orders delivered on the first try, divided by orders attempted. It is a fine number to watch, but it does not tell you what to fix. The useful part is tagging every miss with a reason code taken from the table above, then reading the breakdown once a month.
If most misses are access problems, change the checkout form. If most are "nobody home", change the window. If they are scattered, you probably have a data-quality problem upstream of the courier, such as addresses typed in a rush at a point-of-sale terminal.
Frequently asked questions
How many delivery attempts should a courier make?
Two is a sensible starting point for local delivery: the first attempt and one retry, either later the same day or on the next route. A third attempt rarely succeeds when the first two did not, because the cause is usually missing information rather than bad timing. Decide, and write it into your delivery terms.
Should customers pay for redelivery?
That is a business decision rather than a courier one. Some retailers absorb the first redelivery and charge after that; others never charge. Whatever you choose, state it at checkout, not after the miss.
Is photo confirmation the same as a signature?
No. A photo shows where and in what condition an order was left. A signature shows that a named person accepted it. Photo confirmation suits leave-at-door deliveries; use a named recipient or signature for gifts and higher-value items.
What if the customer says the order never arrived?
Start with the drop-off photo and tracking history, which show when and where it was left. Then ask the customer to check with neighbours, the concierge, or the building's mail room. In multi-unit buildings a parcel left at the wrong door is one of the usual explanations.
Tell us how you want missed attempts handled when you set up your account: retry, re-route, or return. We will build the route around that rule.