On-time manifesting is a delivery goal for every business. Find out why manifesting early isn’t good for your customers.
Video: The Australia Post logo sits at the top of a red screen. A brunette woman sits under the text, "eCommerce Jargon Busters: Early Manifesting."
Audio: Woman: Early manifesting, that's when you really believe that you’re gonna get up to your alarm.
Video: The woman reads from a card that has an Australia Post logo on the back. Later, the text she's reading is typed onto a red background.
Audio: Woman: A manifest is a document a business creates via their sending portal to summarise shipping details, including the number, size, and weights of items being lodged for delivery. When you manifest before the parcel has left your facility, the customer gets a notification to alert them it's on its way, which isn't the case, and can create unrealistic delivery expectations. So on-time manifesting is the goal.
Video: The woman shakes her head and smiles.
Audio: Woman: Nope, that's not what I was thinking.
Video: Before a red background a microphone hovers over a stool. An Australia Postcard lies on the stool. Text reads, “eCommerce Jargon Busters. [Jah-gawn bust-uhz] noun + plural noun.” The Australia Post logo appears just above the stool.
A shipping manifest, or delivery manifest, is a document a business creates via their sending portal to summarise shipping details, including the number, size and weights of parcels being lodged for delivery. This gives the carrier a clear idea of what they’re collecting and is the starting point for calculating shipping charges.
Find out more about shipping manifests.
Early manifesting is when you submit a shipping manifest before the parcels are handed to our delivery team.
You need to manifest when you hand the parcels over to Australia Post – which is usually when our team picks them up from you. It might be tempting to prepare it earlier but, when it comes to manifesting, the goal is to be right on time.
When you manifest before the parcel has left your facility the customer gets a notification to alert them it is on the way. This creates unrealistic delivery expectations, which can result in a negative customer experience.
On-time manifesting, that is when the parcel leaves the facility, is considered the ideal for creating a positive customer delivery experience.
Similar to early manifesting affecting the customer’s delivery experience, late manifesting can also have an impact. When you manifest late, the customer won’t receive notifications alerting them the parcel is on the move. They may think you’ve been slow to ship their order, or contact you to check its status; resulting in more calls to your customer service teams or a poor shopping experience overall.
This article was originally published on 30 November 2023 and has been updated with new information.
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