> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vortexiq.ai/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Dispatch-to-Collection Lag, NetDispatch > Hours from NetDispatch dispatch event to carrier-side collection scan. The core NetDispatch SLA - >24h lag means warehouse cutoff missed or ... How to read... **Metrics type:** [Key Metrics](/nerve-centre/overview#metrics-types-explained) • **Category:** [Shipping & Courier](/nerve-centre/connectors#connectors-by-type) > Hours from NetDispatch dispatch event to carrier-side collection scan. The core NetDispatch SLA - >24h lag means warehouse cutoff missed or carrier-side delay. ## At a glance > Median hours between Net Dispatch label-generation event and the carrier-side collection scan (driver pickup from merchant warehouse). UK-specific operational metric: a long lag means the merchant printed labels but the carrier hasn't collected, eating into the carrier's commit window before transit even starts. The "did the carrier turn up to my warehouse on time?" number. | | | | ------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **What it counts** | `MEDIAN(carrier_collection_scan_timestamp - net_dispatch_label_creation_timestamp)` in hours, over the trailing 7 days. Median (not mean) used to dampen outliers. | | **Why this is UK-specific** | UK ecommerce shipping is heavily collection-based: drivers visit merchant warehouses on scheduled routes once or twice daily. Missed-collection costs an entire day of transit time. US shipping is more drop-off and pickup-on-demand, so this metric is less prominent. | | **Carrier collection patterns** | Royal Mail OBA: typically 1 collection/day at scheduled time (16:00-19:00 most common). DPD: 1-2 collections/day; can be on-demand for high-volume shippers. Evri: 1 collection/day, often missed especially in rural areas. ParcelForce: 1-2 collections/day. | | **Healthy lag** | \<12 hours is excellent (label-printed-by-noon collected-same-day). 12-24 hours acceptable (next-morning collection). >24 hours problematic (carrier missed scheduled day). >48 hours = repeated missed-collection escalation needed. | | **Time-of-print effect** | Lag depends on when the merchant prints the label. A label printed at 09:00 with carrier collection at 17:00 = 8 hour lag. A label printed at 18:00 (after collection has happened) misses today's collection and waits until next-day = 18-24 hour lag. | | **Service level scope** | All Net Dispatch carriers pooled. Use [Shipments by Service](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/shipments-by-service) to split. Some carriers (Evri/Yodel) chronically run higher lag. | | **Holiday surge** | UK Q4 (peak season) increases lag 30-80% as carrier collections become saturated. Drivers can't fit all merchants into their daily route. | | **Time window** | `7D` (rolling 7 days, weekly operational view) | | **Alert trigger** | `median >24h` | | **Roles** | owner, operations | ## Calculation Calculated automatically from your NetDispatch data. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading. ## Worked example A UK DTC homeware merchant in Leicester with mid-size warehouse, multi-carrier collection schedule. Reading taken at 09:00 GMT on 12 Mar 26 for the trailing 7 days. | Carrier | Shipments | Median lag (h) | 90th percentile lag (h) | Scheduled collection window | | ---------------------------- | --------- | -------------- | ----------------------- | --------------------------- | | Royal Mail OBA | 1,310 | 6.2 | 13.8 | 17:00-18:00 daily | | Royal Mail Tracked 24 | 480 | 5.8 | 12.4 | Same | | DPD Next Day | 320 | 4.1 | 9.6 | 16:00-17:00 daily | | Evri 3-5 Day | 880 | 18.4 | 38.2 | 14:00-19:00 (variable) | | Yodel Standard | 195 | 22.6 | 44.0 | Variable | | **All carriers (this card)** | **3,235** | **9.4** | **24.8** | mixed | The card reads **9.4 hours median** (alert at >24h has not tripped at median) but Evri and Yodel individually exceed the threshold. Five things to notice: 1. **DPD at 4.1 hours median is excellent.** DPD's collection routing is highly disciplined; drivers arrive within 30-60 minutes of scheduled window. The 4.1 hours reflects label-print-time and morning-print pattern. 2. **Royal Mail at 6.2 hours is good.** RM's 17:00-18:00 collection is consistent; merchant printing through the morning sees a clean same-day collection cycle. 3. **Evri at 18.4 hours median is the operational headline.** Evri collections in some regions (especially mid-Leicester) are unreliable; drivers sometimes miss collection windows entirely. 90th-percentile of 38 hours means 10% of Evri parcels wait nearly 2 days for pickup. This is eating into the 3-5 day Evri commit window. 4. **Yodel at 22.6 hours and 44h 90th-percentile is worse.** Should escalate to Net Dispatch CSM for collection-route review. 5. **Combined effect on on-time-delivery.** 90th-percentile lag of 24.8 hours across all carriers means 10% of parcels have already lost a day before transit starts. This explains some of the [On-Time Delivery Rate](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/on-time-delivery-rate) softness in the Evri/Yodel subset. Note: pair with [Failed Collection](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/exception-rate) (subset of exception rate showing collections that didn't happen) and [On-Time Delivery Rate](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/on-time-delivery-rate). The merchant could shift evening-printed labels to next-day-print to align better with collection cycles, reducing the lag tail. ## Sibling cards merchants should reference together | Card | Why pair it with Dispatch-to-Collection Lag | What the combination tells you | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------ | | [On-Time Delivery Rate](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/on-time-delivery-rate) | Direct downstream impact. | Long lag eats commit windows; on-time degrades. | | [Avg Transit (days)](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/avg-transit) | Lag is a transit-component. | High lag + same transit-after-collection = total transit climbing. | | [Exception Rate](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/exception-rate) | "Failed collection" subset. | Collections that didn't happen at all show as exceptions. | | [Shipments by Service](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/shipments-by-service) | Per-carrier lag split. | Identifies which carrier has the lag problem. | | [Late Shipments](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/late-shipments) | Downstream count. | Late count grows when lag eats transit budget. | | Cross-connector: WMS pick-pack timing | Upstream input. | If WMS prints labels late in day, lag worsens. | ## Reconciling against the vendor's own dashboard **Where to look in Net Dispatch's own dashboard:** [Net Dispatch Dashboard](https://www.netdispatch.com/) → **Reports → Collection Performance**. Shows lag per carrier per period. The card mirrors the aggregate. **Why our number may legitimately differ from Net Dispatch's portal:** | Reason | Direction | Why | | -------------------------------- | -------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **Median vs mean** | Either | Card uses median (robust to outliers); portal sometimes defaults to mean which one large miss can move significantly. | | **Time zone** | Boundary cases | Both should agree at UK local time; UTC interpretation can shift edge cases. | | **Print-time vs label-creation** | Either | Some setups create labels in batch then print later; this can affect the start-time interpretation. | **Cross-connector reconciliation:** | Card | Expected relationship | What causes legitimate divergence | | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------- | --------------------------------- | | [`royal_mail.rm_collection_lag`](/nerve-centre/royal_mail/rm_collection_lag) | Direct-RM if separately connected. | Different shipment population. | ## Known limitations / merchant FAQs **Why is Evri's lag so much higher than Royal Mail's?** Evri's collection routing uses self-employed couriers with less route-discipline than Royal Mail's salaried workforce. Drivers prioritise drop-off (delivery) over pickup, especially in busy periods; collection windows can slip 2-4 hours or be missed entirely. The cost saving from Evri (£1-2/parcel) comes with this operational cost. **Should I print labels earlier in the day to reduce lag?** Yes. If your collection window is 17:00-18:00 and you print labels through the afternoon, anything printed after 16:00 misses today's collection. Shift label-printing to morning batches (09:00-13:00) wherever possible; the lag drops 6-12 hours on average. **Can I add a second daily collection?** Yes for high-volume merchants. DPD offers AM-and-PM collection for £8-£15/week; Royal Mail OBA can be configured for 2x daily for £20+/week. Often justified above 100 parcels/day if morning-rush volume is significant. **The lag jumped 50% this week. What happened?** Three usual causes. (1) Carrier-side route disruption (driver illness, vehicle issue, route restructure). (2) Merchant-side label-print pattern shift (e.g. WMS upgrade pushed printing later in day). (3) Weather affecting carrier collection routes. Investigate via the [Failed Collection](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/exception-rate) detail rows. **Q4 effect?** UK Q4 typically sees 30-80% lag increase as carrier collection routes saturate. Drivers physically can't fit all merchants. Plan: shift label-printing earlier, request additional collections, switch to drop-off at carrier depots where possible. **My DPD collection is 4 hours but Royal Mail is 6 hours. Why the gap?** DPD collections are typically earlier in the day (16:00-17:00) and DPD's drivers are more time-disciplined. Royal Mail collections later (17:00-18:00) plus their later cutoff time means morning-printed labels sit longer. Both are healthy ranges. **Drop-off at carrier depot vs collection?** Some merchants drop-off Royal Mail or ParcelForce parcels at the local depot or post office instead of waiting for collection. This eliminates lag (the carrier-side scan happens at drop-off) and saves OBA collection fees. Trade-off: requires staff time at drop-off. Worth considering for sub-100-parcel-day merchants. **Failed collection vs lagged collection?** Failed collection (no carrier-side scan ever, parcel sits indefinitely) is in [Exception Rate](/nerve-centre/kpi-cards/net-dispatch/exception-rate). Lagged collection (eventually picked up but late) is in this card. Different operational interventions: failed needs carrier escalation; lagged needs print-time discipline. *** ### Tracked live in Vortex IQ Nerve Centre *Dispatch-to-Collection Lag* is one of hundreds of KPI pulses Vortex IQ tracks across NetDispatch and 70+ other ecommerce connectors. Nerve Centre runs the detection layer; Vortex Mind investigates the cause when something moves; Ask Viq lets you interrogate any number in plain English. 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