Last mile · Metro delivery
Why last-mile is where
your freight budget leaks
The final ten kilometres of a delivery cost more per kilometre than the eight hundred before it — and failed attempts double it. Here's how we stop the leak.
Last-mile is the expensive bit everyone underestimates. A pallet can cross the state for the cost of a decent dinner, then burn half that again getting from the depot to a loading dock in Fortitude Valley. The drive is cheap; the doorbell is dear.
What makes it expensive isn't distance — it's stops, stairs, waiting, and receivers who weren't told to expect anything. A failed delivery is the budget killer: the truck ran, the driver waited, the freight comes back, and the whole run repeats. One failed drop costs more than two successful ones.
Our fix is aggressively unglamorous. We check the receiver's details at booking, we call ahead twenty minutes out, and we send vehicles that can actually get the freight off the truck at a residential address.
The last ten metres
Reading the detail
Written by Jodie Walsh, metro runs coordinator — she books the SEQ rounds this article is about.
A failed delivery isn't bad luck. It's usually a missing phone call, a wrong gate note, or a truck that couldn't reach the door.
The boring fixes that work
Call-ahead is the single biggest one — a two-minute call kills most failed attempts before they happen. Second is honest access notes: "rear dock via McLachlan St, utes only" is worth more than a barcode.
Third is grouping runs properly. A well-built metro run drops 12–15 stops without the driver speeding or the schedule lying. That's the maths that keeps a $38 metro price viable.
What you can do as the sender
Three things, all free: give us the receiver's direct phone number, tell us about stairs and tail-lift needs at booking, and make sure someone actually expects the freight. Do those and your last-mile cost stops leaking on its own.
The short version
- Failed delivery = more than double the cost
- Call-ahead is the cheapest fix that exists
- Access notes beat barcodes for reliability
- Receiver's phone number is worth gold
Suburban last-mile — the cheapest kilometre to get wrong.
The last-mile maths
Why the final suburb costs more than the first five hundred kilometres.
More from the dispatch desk
Freight going to real addresses?
Metro runs leave all day from Hamilton — book by 15:00 and it moves today.