Delivery in E-Commerce: Choosing Couriers and Logistics

Delivery services are the process of collecting the order from the warehouse or store, transporting it, handing it to the buyer, recording the outcome and, when needed, returning it.

The cheapest courier is not always the cheapest delivery. A buyer not found on the first attempt, a wrong address, cash-on-delivery transferred late and an untracked return can turn a low tariff into an expensive process.

Delivery is the physical part of the seller's promise. If the site says "1–2 days," the warehouse's preparation time, the courier's pickup hours, the area and rest days must carry that promise together.

What delivery models exist for e-commerce?

The Law "On Postal Communication" defines acceptance, sorting, storage, transport and delivery to the addressee as parts of the postal service. Express post and courier services are separate concepts in the law. An e-commerce business, however, is not obliged to give the whole chain to one party.

If the online store is just starting, one main and one backup partner are enough. Connecting five couriers at once is not choice — it is oversight burden. In the dropshipping model, even though the seller does not see the parcel, the delivery promise, information and returns responsibility given to the buyer still rest with the store.

What should we compare when choosing a delivery service?

According to the Ministry of Digital Development and Transport's explanation, express postal service is among the activities requiring a licence. Before the contract, ask not for the brand name but the legal entity, TIN, the service's legal type and the applicable licence details. Legal status is no quality guarantee, but it is where the checking starts.

14 questions for the provider

1. Which cities, districts and villages are in the service zone?
2. What is the pickup cut-off time and the minimum daily volume?
3. Are the timeframes counted in calendar days or business days?
4. How does the tariff change by actual weight, volumetric weight, zone, distance and floor?
5. Are the second delivery attempt and address changes chargeable?
6. Is cash or card accepted at the door, and when are the funds transferred?
7. Are a shipment code, live status, proof and history provided?
8. Is there an API, plugin and server notification for the site or a Shopify store?
9. What are the call and message rules to the buyer, and how many attempts are made?
10. From whom, within what period and at what tariff are returns collected?
11. What are the documentation, investigation and compensation rules for loss, damage and shortfalls?
12. Are there restrictions for liquids, food, glass, batteries, large sizes and expensive goods?
13. Do the reports show the order code, status, tariff, extra fees and payment transfers?
14. When the contract ends, how are open parcels, cash-on-delivery and data handed over?

The Rules on the Provision of Postal Services state the user's right to information on tariffs, delivery times, prohibited and restricted goods, the licence number, working hours and operator liability. Do not leave these as a sales rep's verbal answers; move them into the contract and its annex.

How is delivery's real cost calculated?

Seeing 4.20 AZN in the tariff table is easy. The real decision metric is the full cost of one successfully delivered order:

Cost per successful delivery = all logistics and operating costs ÷ delivered orders

These figures are not market tariffs; they are a calculation example. If cash-on-delivery transferred late, a loss reserve and customer support time also create costs for you, add them separately. In e-commerce marketing it is more honest to measure profit not at the moment of ordering but after the order is delivered and the return window has passed.

How is the process built from order to handover?

1. The store creates an immutable order code, product, quantity, amount and payment status.
2. The buyer checks the name, phone, city/district, street, building, apartment and any directions.
3. The warehouse checks the product and defects, packs it appropriately, and records the weight and dimensions.
4. Only the minimum information needed for delivery is passed to the courier.
5. The partner returns a tracking code and acceptance time for the parcel it receives.
6. The buyer gets a safe tracking link, an estimated delivery window and a contact route.
7. Handover, failed attempts, refusals and returns are recorded in the store system with distinct statuses.
8. At day's end, the orders, the courier report and cash-on-delivery transfers are reconciled.

Shipping the parcel before online payment is confirmed can split the stock and money statuses. In an Instagram order too, the order code and provider confirmation should be kept instead of a screenshot. The courier must not ask for the buyer's card details by message.

Do not squeeze the address into one free-text field. When city/district, street, building, apartment, phone and directions are separate fields, both finding errors and switching partners become easier. "The centre," "next to the park" and "have them call me" are not a full address.

Names, phones, addresses, orders and handover records are personal data. Define the purpose, legal basis or consent, the minimum volume passed to the courier, access rights, retention and deletion under the Law "On Personal Data". Giving the courier your whole customer base is not necessary to deliver one order.

Which metrics measure a courier's quality?

A service level agreement (SLA) is not just the sentence "we will deliver on time." The metric's name, its start and end points, the exceptions, the data source, the reporting period and the action when results are weak must be written down.

ICTA's express post complaints index for Q1 2026 compares operators by weighting complaint shares against market share and also shows response times. The document itself notes the index covers only complaints received by the Agency. So use it not as a final rating but as an extra signal alongside the contract and your own pilot data.

How are returns, damage and complaints managed?

Return logistics is not an afterthought designed post-sale. Where the parcel goes when the buyer refuses, to whom it is handed, who inspects the product's condition and when the stock and money statuses change must be written first.

The Law "On Electronic Commerce" requires showing delivery costs and terms, payment and performance rules and the withdrawal option before the order. Withdrawal and return exceptions can vary by product type; do not apply one general sentence to all products.

If damage is visible, tie the photo, parcel code, time and report to the same incident. The postal rules provide a report procedure for damaged or incomplete shipments. If the claim period, required documents, liability limits and compensation path are not clear in the contract, an open risk hides behind the cheap tariff.

Use the operator's own official complaints route first. If there is no result, ICTA's E-Complaint system lets you track complaints to postal operators. Inside the business too, every incident should keep an owner, a final response time and a closure reason.

How should delivery information appear on the site?

The buyer must not see the delivery cost only at the payment's last step. The service zone, preparation time, transit window, order cut-off, tariff or calculation rule, free-delivery condition, handover options, failed attempts and the return path must be written on one visible page.

Google's current ShippingService structured data lets a standard shipping policy state the locations, costs, weight, dimensions and timing conditions. If a product has a specific exception, separate delivery details can be given in the product offer. The code must match the visible page; correct markup does not guarantee a rich result.

Artificial intelligence (AI) can draft the delivery policy, but it must not invent the service zone, prices and timeframes. If the product description gets the dimensions, weight, special storage and breakage risk wrong, even the best courier cannot fix a false promise.

How do we test a delivery service with 30 orders?

1. Choose three zones: nearby, the city's edge and a region.
2. Include ordinary, large, fragile and cash-on-delivery orders in the plan.
3. Give the same order basket to two partners on close days.
4. Record the pickup time, first status, buyer notification and proof of handover.
5. Test one wrong address, one unreachable buyer and one return scenario.
6. Write down every fee beyond the tariff and the minutes the team spends.
7. Reconcile the cash-on-delivery credit time per order.
8. After 30 orders, compare the cost per successful order and the six SLA metrics.

Thirty orders do not deliver a final verdict on the market. But they give enough real material to surface the address, attempt, return, reporting and support problems invisible in the sales pitch. As volume grows, re-evaluate quarterly.

Conclusion: choose the courier by the handover result, not the tariff

In e-commerce the sale does not end with payment. The order completes when the product reaches the buyer correct, complete and on time, and the money and stock records close.

First check the licence and the contract's boundary. Then measure the cost, timing, first attempts, returns and reconciliation with the same 30 orders. Give the decision to the delivered parcel, not the presentation.