At a glance
Share of Net Dispatch-routed parcels that received a UK carrier exception scan in transit. Net Dispatch normalises Royal Mail, DPD, Evri, Yodel exception event codes into a unified taxonomy. Leading indicator for late deliveries.
| What it counts | COUNT(Net Dispatch shipments WHERE tracking events INCLUDE any exception code) / COUNT(shipments) over the trailing 30 days. |
| Exception types (Net Dispatch normalised) | delivery_attempted_recipient_absent, address_issue (postcode-typo, missing flat number, unrecognised street), held_at_depot, customs_hold (international), weather_disruption, damaged, lost, redirected_safe_place, failed_collection (parcel never picked up from merchant). |
| UK-specific exception types | ”Held at depot for collection” is uniquely common in UK due to recipient-not-home in flats and dense urban areas with no safe drop-off; carriers leave a “We Missed You” card. Failed collection is also UK-specific: when carrier drivers fail to pick up from merchant warehouse on schedule (typical for Evri/Yodel rural pickup). |
| Lead-indicator semantics | 50 to 70% of exceptions resolve on next-day attempt; some escalate to 1-7 day delays. |
| Service level scope | All Net Dispatch carriers pooled. |
| Returns / RTO | Excluded. |
| Holiday surge | UK Q4 (mid-November to 24 Dec) typically sees 1.5x to 3x normal exception rate. |
| Time window | 30D vsP |
| Alert trigger | >3% (warn). UK steady-state typically 1.5 to 3.5% (slightly higher than US baseline due to flat-block address complexity). |
| Sentiment key | gauge with thresholds good=1, warn=3 (lower is better) |
| 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 fashion merchant via Net Dispatch. Reading taken at 09:00 GMT on 12 Mar 26 for the trailing 30 days vs the prior 30 days.| Exception type | Shipments affected | % of total | Vs prior 30D |
|---|---|---|---|
| Delivery attempted (recipient absent) | 412 | 2.5% | +0.3 ppt |
| Address issue | 280 | 1.7% | +0.5 ppt |
| Held at depot | 168 | 1.0% | flat |
| Weather disruption | 32 | 0.2% | +0.1 ppt |
| Failed collection | 28 | 0.2% | flat |
| Customs hold (international) | 18 | 0.1% | -0.1 ppt |
| Damaged | 14 | 0.1% | flat |
| All exceptions (this card) | 952 | 5.8% | +0.8 ppt vs 5.0% |
- Address-issue rate climbing 0.5 ppt is the headline. Investigation: the merchant launched a new mobile-checkout flow in late February that doesn’t validate UK postcodes against Royal Mail’s PAF (Postcode Address File). Fix: integrate Loqate or AddressFinder for UK address validation at checkout. Expected drop: 0.4 to 0.7 ppt within 2 weeks.
- Recipient-absent at 2.5% is normal for UK urban DTC. UK households (especially flats) are typically empty during business hours; “delivery attempted” is irreducible to ~2% for non-safe-place merchants. Mitigation: enable safe-place options at checkout (porch, neighbour, parcel locker) which Net Dispatch can pass through to most carriers.
- Held at depot at 1.0% is part of the UK pattern. “Held at depot for collection” is common when delivery attempt fails and recipient hasn’t arranged redelivery. The recipient must collect within 7-18 days (carrier-dependent) or the parcel returns to sender.
- Failed collection at 0.2% indicates merchant-side issue. 28 shipments where Evri/Yodel drivers failed to pick up from the merchant’s warehouse on schedule. Investigate with Net Dispatch CSM; usually traces to specific driver routes or unreliable pickup windows.
- The 952 exceptions in 30 days will produce roughly 480-670 late deliveries downstream. This card is the early-warning signal for the on-time number.
Sibling cards merchants should reference together
| Card | Why pair it with Exception Rate | What the combination tells you |
|---|---|---|
| On-Time Delivery Rate | Lagging confirmation. | Exception rising 24-72 hours before on-time drops is the early warning. |
| Late Shipments | Lagging count. | 50-70% of exceptions become late. |
| Returned to Sender | Worst-case outcome. | Held-at-depot exceptions that fail collection become RTS within 7-18 days. |
| Dispatch-to-Collection Lag | UK-specific upstream. | Failed-collection exceptions feed this. |
Cross-connector: royal_mail.rm_exception_rate | Direct-RM subset. | Same. |
| Cross-connector: UK address-validation tools (Loqate, AddressFinder) | Upstream cause. | High address-issue rate suggests checkout-side validation isn’t firing. |
Reconciling against the vendor’s own dashboard
Where to look in Net Dispatch’s own dashboard: Net Dispatch Dashboard → Tracking → Filter by status: Exception. Lists shipments with active or recent exception events, per type. The card aggregates; the dashboard supports row-level triage. Why our number may legitimately differ from Net Dispatch’s portal:| Reason | Direction | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Carrier event-code mapping | Either | Net Dispatch maps carrier-specific codes to a unified taxonomy; some Evri/Yodel custom codes have edge-case mappings. |
| Polling lag | Ours lower for “today” | Net Dispatch polls every 30-60 minutes. |
| Exception duration | Either | The card counts any exception event in the period regardless of resolution; portal sometimes filters to active-only. |
| Card | Expected relationship | What causes legitimate divergence |
|---|---|---|
royal_mail.rm_exception_rate | Net Dispatch-RM subset. | Direct-RM may include non-Net-Dispatch volume. |
dpd.dpd_exception_rate | Same for DPD. | Same. |