The biggest issue facing logistics providers when it comes to providing fast and efficient delivery is the customer address. Research shows that 71% of businesses blame delivery failures on poor address data. That’s not surprising, given that 20% of addresses provided online contain errors, and customer databases decay at the rate of 25% a year, as people move, get divorced or die.

For the courier, inaccurate data results in an increase in fuel consumption, as well as an inefficient use of staff time in an often-vain attempt to find the correct address.

For the retailer, a failed delivery can cost around $16, although it can be much higher for big-ticket items. Then there’s the cost of correcting the address and redelivery, resulting in delayed fulfilment and an overall poor customer experience.

While the onus is on retailers to provide their carriers with an accurate customer address, some lack adequate data-quality processes. Results include incorrect deliveries, higher fuel costs, wasted staff time and degraded sustainability efforts.

Moreover, logistics companies often have customer address data from a number of different retail clients, each with their own format and idiosyncrasies, which can slow down the delivery process. 

Depending on agreements with individual retailers, it makes sense, therefore, for those in logistics to have address-cleaning processes in place. A key part of this includes carrying out address verification and cleansing, as well as obtaining geocodes to provide smooth last-mile fulfillment.

For couriers, a best practice is to undertake address verification. When sourcing an appropriate service, make sure it has access to data from postal operators. Otherwise, it’s not possible to guarantee that the address is correct, exists or is usable for fulfilment. In the U.S., for example, make sure the service is using the Coding Accuracy Support System (CASS) certified for the U.S. Postal Service. Never rely on Google Maps or a search engine to check the accuracy of addresses, as they don’t usually have access to this data.

Address verification is even more important when it comes to international logistics, because each country has its own address format which can cause logistics and fulfilment issues if the address is incorrectly standardized and validated. 

Additionally, in the U.S. and U.K., run the National Change of Address (NCOA) databases provided by USPS and Royal Mail, respectively, against held customer data, which highlights those who have moved or passed away. Other countries have similar data sets.

An important part of the process, which can be offered as an add-on to retail customers, is data suppression or cleansing. These services help to standardize address formats, as well as highlight those customers who are no longer at an address.

Data-cleansing services should also include deceased flagging. This prevents the distribution of mail and other communications to those who have passed away, which can cause distress to friends and relatives.

The delivery of data quality in real time has never been easier. A scalable, standalone software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform can be deployed within hours, and requires no coding, integration or lengthy training. The technology is able to cleanse and correct names, addresses, emails and telephone numbers worldwide from official data sources such as government agencies, credit agencies and utility companies. It can do so as new data is being collected and withheld in batch on-premise. It can also be accessed as a cloud-based application programming interface, or via connector technology such as Microsoft Dynamics and Salesforce.

Accurate addresses can be used to inform geocoding, enhancing last-mile delivery efficiency. The technology provides latitude and longitude (rooftop-level) coordinates, which is important when different properties share an address, such as a plot of land or the street edge of a driveway.

Geocoding is particularly important when it comes to global deliveries, due to different conventions for address formats around the world. For instance, the U.K. uses city, street and house number, but in Japan buildings are referenced by the number of the block they belong to, and within each block buildings are numbered as well. Sometimes it’s done by order of construction, so the numbers don’t necessarily follow each other.

With so much customer address data of varying quality and in different formats in circulation, it’s time for those in logistics to address the continuing issue of misdeliveries. There are plenty of options for cleaning address data quickly and cost-effectively, along with opportunities to white-label and upsell data-cleaning services to clients.

Barley Laing is U.K. managing director at Melissa.