Local Case Study
TCS: ‘Hazir SubKuch’—Making Everything Present
Abstract
The case describes the journey of TCS as it became Pakistan’s leading logistics
service provider. It highlights how and when TCS acquired different logistics and
other value-adding capabilities and how these capabilities, in turn, complimented the
diverse logistics services that TCS offered to a wide variety of businesses.
TCS had been offering a top-notch Express and Logistics service around Pakistan for
30 years. TCS started as a company providing secure distribution of letters and
packages. Customers perceived TCS as a shipping solution provider for all their
goods transportation needs which included parcels, documents, E-commerce
products and even their groceries. The case study highlights that TCS had taken up
some unique and new initiatives. TCS handled four main clientele areas: Corporate,
Consumer, International and E-commerce. For consumer wing, TCS oversaw
bookings of documents and parcels at the express centres, door-to-door
containerized shipments, domestic and international air ticketing, visa application
drop box facility for various countries and financial services in the form of insurance
plans. On the corporate side, TCS provided warehousing and distribution, digital
printing and bulk mail solutions. International and e-commerce both catered
consumer and corporate segments. Over the last decade, TCS had established a
warehousing and distribution wing and a mail management and printing facility. Other
ventures and services that TCS offered were Visatronix, Hazir, Home Movers, E-
COM, TCS Aviation, Mail Management System, Warehouse and Distribution, Intiana,
Sentiments express and Octra.
The case focusses on the decision of whether or not to run an ambitious new
logistics service, that is, Hazir SubKuch (HSK), meant to deliver anything non-
prohibited that a customer wanted, on a crowdsourcing model. In the proposed
crowdsourcing model, after training and evaluation, anyone could assume the role of
a customer service provider by connecting to the system remotely. Similarly, pickup
and delivery jobs could be performed under an Uber-like model by anyone who
owned a ride and had smartphone connectivity. The service was a brainchild of the
new CEO, hired by the founder and chairman as part of the new management team
to bring a fresh dynamism in the company.
TCS: ‘Hazir SubKuch’—Delivering Everything
M. A. Mannan, the President and CEO of TCS Holdings, analysed and assessed the
proposal handed to him by the business and marketing team. The plan was based on
his direction to review and undertake a feasibility study of running the new and
ambitious logistics service named ‘Hazir SubKuch’ on a crowdsourcing model. The
name Hazir SubKuch was developed after intense brainstorming within the company
and its stakeholders and the Urdu term ‘Hazir’ literally meant ‘present’ and ‘SubKuch’
translated to ‘everything’. Using this service, the customers could ask TCS to source
and deliver them anything legal and halal 1 across Pakistan.
This step was taken in view of the existing and potential competition in the evolving
transportation and logistics sector of Pakistan and aimed at disrupting the market by
introducing innovative new services for customer delight. The launch of Hazir
SubKuch was a key element of Mannan’s plans for TCS’s expansion and future
portfolio.
M.A. Mannan, President and CEO TCS Holdings said:
Hazir is an Urdu term, which in literal terms, means ‘present’. This is exactly what
Hazir [SubKuch] aims to do, to be PRESENT in our customer’s lives and to provide
them with whatever they may require… It eventually aims to become a concierge
service devoted to delivering BEYOND our customers’ expectations. It is a truly one of
a kind service that is a symbol of innovation.
Although the service was still in the soft-launch phase, the word about the service
had already reached the market. Mannan was considering two options for this: (a)
use TCS’s own resources for providing the service, as was being done in the soft-
launch; or (b) develop a system under which anyone could register, and after a
training and evaluation process, undertake paid customer service provider or courier
roles through remote connectivity. Under the crowdsourcing model, that is, the latter
option, TCS could tap anyone who had free time to log into the system and take
customer service calls. Similarly, people who had their own rides could take up the
available pickup and delivery jobs through the mobile application. The crowdsourcing
model had advantages in the forms of low expenditure and practically no capacity
constraints. However, the main concern was the level and consistency of service
quality. A compromise on quality could hurt TCS’s hard-earned reputation and
customer trust.
Industry Background
Pakistan was experiencing political stability, a sense of security and greater
confidence in the economy.2 There were smooth democratic transitions and a
significant drop in terrorism-related incidents. Moreover, in the light of the ongoing
work on the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project, a part of China’s
‘One Belt, One Road’ initiative of reviving the Silk Road in order to develop Western
China, a significant increase in economic and logistics activity was forecasted. 3 Some
major infrastructure works were initiated to revamp and extend the existing
transportation networks. The CPEC project was estimated to directly create some
700,000 jobs by 2030.4 The economic activity along the corridor was expected to
create a high demand for warehousing and transportation. The logistics industry of
Pakistan offered a substantial room for growth and lucrative opportunities. 5
There were already quite a few national and international players in the logistics
market. Leopards Courier Services and Overseas Courier Services (OCS) Pakistan,
started operations in 1983 and 1986, respectively. They were the prominent local
players besides TCS.
Leopards had 150 express centres6 while OCS operated 230 plus. OCS had recently
attained more significance after its acquisition by Muller & Phipps (M&P), a well-
established multinational distribution house and a part of Getz Group International. It
was speculated that this high-profile acquisition would boost OCS’s operations and
credibility. Federal Express (FedEx), DHL and Agility were the major international
logistics players operating in Pakistan, though the former two mainly focussed on
international shipments, while the latter focussed on overland transportation and
warehousing.
The Beginning
Initially, Britain set up postal systems across their empire, including, what is now,
Pakistan, with the government retaining the sole monopoly over the distribution of
mail. On its independence in 1947, Pakistan inherited the Post Office Act of 1898,
which stated that the transportation of ‘letters’ was an exclusive privilege of the
Federal Government.
Khalid Awan, the Chairman of TCS, recalled:
This effectively left no scope for the courier companies. Similar acts were adopted by
other countries, but the monopolies were subsequently suspended through specific
interpretations of the term ‘letters’. For example, in the USA, anything posing a loss if
delivered late could be transported through private services. It was based on a
negotiation by the industry that Pakistan liberalized the interpretation of the law,
creating a room for the courier services.
TCS was founded by Khalid Awan, an engineer by qualification, in 1983 with financial
and operational support from his elder brother running DHL Pakistan at that time as
its chairman.7 Khalid had worked at DHL Pakistan as the Managing Director. The
inception of TCS came as a joint venture with DHL, in which TCS handled domestic
operations, while DHL managed international operations. TCS pioneered the courier
services for urgent deliveries in the country, filling the vacuum to provide fast and
reliable deliveries. TCS’s connection with DHL provided the initial boost with the
advanced capabilities and leading international exposure. The engagement with DHL
was short-lived. Within 2 years, TCS started operating independently as a result of
DHL’s move to focus only on international deliveries.
The Growth of TCS
The Banking Project and the 1980s
When TCS started, its main business was concerned with the secure and fast
distribution of packages and parcels through outsourced transportation mainly
between the major cities. In 1985, a significant development happened in the
national banking sector, which provided a breakthrough for TCS. At that time, five
public-owned banks were functioning under the Ministry of Finance, and governed,
coordinated and regulated by a body called Pakistan Banking Council. 8 To curb the
lethargy and bring in efficiency at these banks, the then finance minister, Dr
Mehboob-ul-Haq, developed a charter document and obligated the banks to process
the outstation cheques in less than 72 hours, as opposed to the 3 weeks it used to
take. The banks were given a 6-month period to deliver results. This served as a
critical issue for the Banking Council. Due to the nonexistence of electronic banking,
the cheques had to be physically posted to the corresponding bank branches in order
to get cleared. The new processing time-window meant that this had to be done
overnight. There were around 6,500 branches to be covered, with some being more
than 2,000 km apart.
The Banking Council invited courier companies, including TCS, at their head office to
know their interest in establishing the overnight delivery service for the banks. The
companies were provided all the relevant information and were asked to return for
another meeting in 1 week with their proposals. It was a large scale and complex
project. The courier company that would take on this project would be entering into a
logistics partnership with banks, which meant that all their processes had to be
aligned with those of the banks’ across the country. TCS, represented by Khalid and
a team of operational managers, with the willingness to take on the task, was the
only company that showed up in the next meeting at the Banking Council.
Khalid agreed to take on the project while lacking the required transportation
arrangements. Arranging the vehicles was his first focus after the meeting. He solved
the problem by speaking to the owners of the workshop where TCS motorbikes used
to go for maintenance who agreed to arrange and finance the required vehicles.
Elaborating the challenges and opportunities, Khalid stated:
We were a small company. A large number of people and equipment [vehicles] were
required to carry out this big operation. It was a very big operational challenge but
with an understanding of how FedEx did it, I believed that it was doable. It took
around four years to cover all the bank branches. Along the way, TCS managed to
build a strong and extensive logistics network. There was though a cost for it. We
knew that the company would be out of profit for a long time; for up to ten years.
Meanwhile, the company also established a set of core values around quality,
efficiency, ethics, and creative growth. The focus was to attain profitability via
efficiency, be fair with the customers, and grow by means of constant innovation.
At the time TCS started, it had around 350 personnel, and by the time it completed
the project implementation for the banks, it had around 1,500; a threefold increase in
4 years. By 1989, TCS managed to set up twelve computer centres across the
country, exchanging data using the dial-up connection, 9 started a unique gift delivery
service, named Sentiment Express, that delivered items like cakes and flowers
(booked from the express centres) at doorsteps, and set up international operations
by establishing a company in the UK.
The 1990s
In the early 1990s, TCS incorporated an email system for streamlining operations
and more efficient information sharing. Besides this, TCS saw a major development
in the form of its own aviation setup. In 1991, TCS placed the bid for the first private
airline licence in the country, subsequently starting the air operations in support of its
courier services by inducting an AN-26 (a twin-engine transport aircraft). Towards the
end of the decade, TCS expanded its international business by establishing
operations in UAE and Canada.
The 2000s
By 2000, TCS was a well-established and trusted courier company with twenty-four
express (retail) centres, and around 600 two-wheelers and eighty four-wheelers fleet.
This was the decade of the reinforcement of the capabilities, standardization and the
inclusion of several new services. In the first half, the entire setup was revamped with
standardized outlets and courier uniforms. A low-priced parcel service, known as the
Red Box service, was launched to allow express delivery of boxed packages of up to
25 kg. Also, a dedicated logistics/transportation company was formed.
In the TCS twentieth anniversary report, Khalid wrote:
Where is the relationship between TCS and its customers headed? Like all successful
relationships, it is headed towards greater maturity and fulfilment. Whereas up until
now, we have focused on earning the trust of our customers, by fulfilling their needs,
from now onwards, we aim to go beyond this, towards greater customized solutions
for our rather diversified customer base. At the heart of it all, in our customer success,
rests our own future, and the greatest asset we can ever build is customer
confidence.
TCS wanted to provide various value-adding services along with its courier and
transportation business. In the latter half of the decade, it had established a
warehousing and distribution wing, a mail management solutions (MMS) division and
a printing facility. Larger cargo aircrafts were inducted into TCS’s aviation fleet.
Through the well-connected network of distribution facilities in the major cities (Figure
1), which further connected smaller surrounding cities, TCS managed to get to
600,000–700,000 touch points10 daily.
Figure 1. Network Connectivity
Source: Company records.
Through its well-established network, TCS was handling mail distribution for the
booming banks and telecommunication companies. Letters, bills and statements
were collected from these organizations (TCS’s corporate clients) and delivered to
their customers. Similar services were being provided to different examination
bodies, for whom TCS ensured secure distribution of examination papers to exam
centres. Identifying MMS as an area of opportunity, in 2006, TCS set up a state-of-
the-art MMS and printing facility, allowing TCS to electronically source data from
customers, print their documents and dispatch the documents from in-house, thereby
saving time, logistics costs and customer overheads. Securing the Election
Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) general election project (Mehdi, 2013) proved to be
very favourable for this particular business.
As Shafiq Malik, Director Operations, explained:
In 2006, we launched the MMS and print shop setup. We got lucky because the
country’s elections followed soon. As soon as we launched the printing shop, we got a
PKR 80 million worth ECP printing project. The total cost of investment got covered by
this project. They [ECP] gave us the data, and we did everything else: papers, cover
pages, printing, bookmaking, sequencing, complete quality check, delivery, and
boxing. Not only was our printing shop new, but before it, we hadn’t launched any
production facility. We were experts in logistics, not experts regarding production
facilities. More than 80 million impressions in a 6-month time span were record-
breaking printing in Asia, according to our suppliers.
The high-security printing facility, was certified to the international security standards,
was Pakistan’s fastest and most efficient document printing setup, with a capacity to
print 3.5 million pages and stuff up to 1.35 million envelopes per day.
Post-2010
It continued to grow in various business fields in line with Khalid’s high ambitions and
vision of innovation and diversification (Figure 2). Further development faced
challenges, as Khalid explained:
To be world-class, we had to keep on doing things that would keep us cutting edge.
However, TCS wasn’t moving forward in this way. TCS had gone into a comfort zone,
which could have taken it down. The consumer side was being neglected. This
country had a consumer base of 180 million, providing a huge potential. We had to
strengthen the consumer side because, firstly, it generated more cash business, and,
secondly, it had high margins. This allowed TCS to bring in more products and value-
added services. We had to move into new lines of business apart from parcels and
documents. Generally, we had to move away from being a shipment company and
embark on a journey to expand horizons. As the company had grown into a 30-year
phase, quite a few of the employees had become old and lacked the relevant skill
sets. Yes, as far as the logistics industry was concerned, we had the most
experienced people, but, more updated and a diverse skill set was required to move
forward.
Figure 2. Shared Vision and Mission Statement
Source: Company documents.
In 2012, a new department named Voice of Customer (VOC) was set up with a prime
focus on enhancing customer satisfaction. This department collected and
consolidated customer feedback from different sources. The feedback was used for
quantitative and qualitative research to produce a meticulous set of prioritized
customer wants and needs for business managers.
Several ventures started post-2010. Besides courier, gift delivery, mail management
and general logistic (warehousing and distribution) services, TCS was also providing
home moving solutions, travel services, visa application drop box facility (handling
document delivery service for foreign diplomatic missions) and training solutions. A
significant step was to move into e-retailing. TCS had won new large-scale projects,
thereby highlighting market confidence on the company’s reliability and coverage. It
had started a passport delivery service for the Ministry of Interior, with the passport
applicant’s fingerprint verification at doorstep delivery. TCS had also secured the bill
distribution task for Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL). A
government-owned company until 2008, PTCL was the largest telecommunications
company in Pakistan with a countrywide customer spread—almost every household
being its customer—as quoted by Shafiq. To test the performance before awarding
their project to TCS, PTCL had allocated it some specific inner-city areas that had a
dense population and ill-defined addresses. TCS was printing bills in-house;
producing bundles for delivery in such a way that delivering bills in the bundle
sequence resulted in overall efficient delivery. Deliveries by TCS significantly
improved PTCL’s bill recoveries due to bills being delivered at the right addresses
and in a short time.
Human Resources—Post-2010
TCS enjoyed a trend of long-term commitment from its employees. There were
several examples, including that of Shafiq and other senior management, where an
employee had joined TCS at an entry-level and made it through to a top position.
This, according to Shafiq, inculcated a greater sense of ownership.
A new human resource development (HRD) plan was introduced. It emphasized (a)
retaining the human resource already present within the company and further
developing it through several training initiatives, and (b) inducting experienced
people from different industries so they could bring fresh ideas, thinking and
initiatives based on their exposure.
Along with the introduction of a new HRD plan, the employees who had served for a
minimum of 8 years were offered a franchise scheme in 2011. Under this model, the
employees got a decent revenue sharing formula, and TCS got partners who were
familiar with its working, knowing the processes and the dos and don’ts of the
organization. An employee singing-up for the scheme had to pay the cost of the
outlet in easy instalments once the franchise was up and running. This was usually
after 4–6 months of the start.
To bring in diverse experience and a fresh perspective, TCS inducted M. A. Mannan
as President and CEO in 2014. Hailing from the banking sector and familiar with the
talent pool there, he brought in several other management team members from the
same sector. Banking happened to be one of the most developed sectors in Pakistan
in terms of management skills, and bankers were familiar with various industries due
to their interactions. TCS also began to hire young people as graduate management
trainees, service ambassadors (exclusively trained customer service advisors) and
couriers.
Since its establishment in 1983, TCS had come a long way and had a diverse service
portfolio in both the corporate and consumer domains. It had more than 800 express
centres (retail outlets for walk-in customers) and covered over 2,000 destinations
associated with regions, areas and stations that were connected through road and air
links (Figure 4). It handled around 130 million documents and parcels, and moved
140,000 metric tonnes of freight annually, deploying 4,500 courier field force, over
500 modern satellite connected ground vehicles, dedicated cargo aircraft and a staff
of 12,000 plus individuals. TCS had a state-of-the-art warehousing facility spread
over 655,000 sq. ft. in the major cities of Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Sukkur,
and cargo storage and sorting facilities in twenty-eight other cities.
Figure 4. Presence of TCS Nationwide
Source: Company records.
The Organization of TCS
TCS had four main units: Consumer, Corporate, International and E-commerce (E-
Com). In contrast to the Consumer and Corporate units, the International and E-com
units extended their services to both consumer and corporate customer segments.
The consumer wing targeted individuals and small businesses. For individuals, the
consumer wing oversaw bookings of documents and parcels at the express centres,
door-to-door containerized transportation of bulky goods, home moving services
(packing and transportation of home items), domestic and international air ticketing,
visa application drop box facility for various countries and financial services in the
form of insurance plans. Individuals could also opt for a 24/7 pickup (within 60
minutes) and delivery service for documents and parcels. Besides this, the consumer
wing catered to small traders and businesses that could not afford tariffs for individual
customers, and also lacked the monthly volume to opt for the fixed price corporate
accounts. Such customers were offered cargo services with reduced rates from and
to selected TCS premises.
On the corporate side, TCS had 15,000 or so clients in almost every industry in the
country. There was a separate service setup for the corporate clients; top-tier
customers had direct access to TCS’s customer relationship agents for issues and
enquiries. The corporate wing served clients mainly by providing them with facilities
including warehousing and distribution, digital printing and bulk mail solutions. It had
a well-rounded assortment of services under the banner of TCS Supply Chain
Advisory, which offered raw material storage and warehousing, inventory packing,
mail management, tracked order fulfilment and distribution, air freight, warranty
management (reverse logistics) and an e-commerce platform through TCS’s E-Com
wing (Figure 5). According to an estimate by TCS, 70 per cent of the banking
industry, 90 per cent of the telecom industry, 70 per cent of the textile industry, 75
per cent of the automotive industry and almost all of the established e-retailers used
TCS’s logistics services.
Figure 5. Supply Chain Advisory
Source: Company records.
The International unit was set up to handle the distinct customer service
requirements for international shipments to and from Pakistan. It served regular walk-
in customers and the corporate clientele (multinationals, financial institutions and
exporters), who needed services to help move their documents and parcels around
the world. The international customer services team took a more proactive approach
to monitor the shipments and resolve any kind of obstruction during the course of
delivery. The E-com unit, in its infancy, was established as a separate unit in view of
the enormous potential of e-commerce in the country. It had Yayvo.com and
Sentiments Express as its main business lines. Yayvo.com was the e-retail website
with a wide assortment of items listed on it. Sentimentsexpress.com listed selected
gift items and was the online counterpart of the Sentiments Express gift delivery
service available from the express centres. E-com was positioned between the
corporate clients, using TCS’s platform for ebusiness, and consumers, shopping at
the platform.
The Revenue Breakdown
The revenue share from the consumer and the corporate businesses was around 55
per cent and 45 per cent, respectively. In terms of the services, the major
contributors to the revenue were the express delivery service for letters and parcels,
transportation of larger item, MMS and Print, and warehousing and distribution
service, generating around 45 per cent, 15 per cent, 15 per cent and 10 per cent of
the total revenue, respectively. Financial services, visa and travel services, home
moving service and the e-commerce business had nominal contributions to the
revenue. TCS’s actual muscle was manifested in the business from the walk-in
customers at the express centres for personal shipments. Here TCS was the market
leader and commanded somewhere close to 65 per cent of the market share. We
provide the most expensive service, but people are willing to stand in a queue at
TCS instead of going elsewhere because they trust us—Adeel Azhar, the Head of
Strategic Planning. As quoted by Naiyar Saifi, the Director of Marketing and Public
Affairs, ‘TCS Kar do’, that is, ‘do TCS’, was a household Urdu phrase in Pakistan for
couriering.
The Focus and Future Aspirations
TCS wanted to move out of its comfort zone by engaging in new lines of businesses,
rather than heavily relying on document and parcel shipments. The idea was to
leverage its massive number of touch points with the customers. On average, 40,000
customers walked into TCS’s express centres daily. Very few companies in Pakistan
were in this position; not even the top banks—Khalid. The vision was to target all
Pakistanis by expanding the service horizons. TCS wanted to strengthen its
consumer side—as it generated more cash business and high margin business—by
bringing in more products and value-added services.
E-commerce
The ‘dot com’ culture had taken off in Pakistan over the last decade with significant
growth in commercial websites. 3G and 4G mobile services were being offered by
the telecom companies and internet penetration was increasing. TCS realized that
there was a great deal of scope in the e-commerce business, where it was already
providing the last mile delivery service to major e-retail businesses.
Salman Hasan, the CEO of TCS E-COM, explained:
Logistically Pakistan is far better than the other third-world countries that are engaged
in or trying to engage in the e-commerce business. For instance, certain countries
don’t even have addresses, and there are also certain countries, e.g., Vietnam, that
lack the presence of premium logistics players. E-commerce was truly struggling in
these places due to the absence of logistics. Here we have a comprehensive
platform.
Enhanced Customer Service
Customer service was deemed to be a strategic issue. TCS was investing a great
deal in the people that it hired for customer service. A new class of graduate
customer service representatives, labelled as service ambassadors, was being
raised by undergoing an intensive training and assessment programme. Multiple
channels of customer communications were set up. Customers could call the
helpline, email, use a mobile application to open a chat or request a call back by
TCS. There was an emphasis on direct customer contact, for example, customers
calling the helpline did not have to go through various pre-recorded messages before
being able to connect to a customer service representative.
Innovations and Technology
Although progressive amongst the local players, TCS operated in a fairly traditional
manner when compared to the advanced international practices. An innovations
department was established to bring in enhanced use of technology. It was working
on a number of initiatives related to information management for the eventual
deployment of an optimization system for the overall network.
One of the main initiatives was related to geo-coding. Although the addresses in
Pakistan were well defined, a proper postal code system (e.g., the postcode system
in the UK and zip codes in the USA) was not put into place by any government. This
served as a hindrance for TCS in terms of logistics planning and optimization, both of
which required precise definition and location of addresses. To resolve this issue,
TCS had started coding the addresses itself by recording the GPS locations of
delivery addresses at the time of delivery. For this reason, TCS was also in talks with
Google, which could code a whole street if the codes for two property numbers on
that specific street were provided to them. Addresses throughout the country were
planned to be coded this way within the next 8 months.
Another important initiative was to equip the couriers with handheld devices. To be
done phase-wise, this initiative was to help shipment tracking and advanced
information gathering. Identity cards with unique bar codes were being placed at
corporate clients’ premises. During a pickup, the rider scanned the client’s identity
card, pasted and scanned a unique code for the package and captured the
package’s photograph. This information, which was initially available at the end of the
shift, when riders dropped parcels at the consolidation centre, was instantaneously
transmitted through the device to the backend, enabling the use of the information to
plan the deliveries on the following day.
Courier Operations
The courier operations were planned under a hub-and-spoke model, in which
shipments were collected and consolidated at the centralized facilities and then
dispatched for delivery. Letters and parcels were transported from collection sites
(express centres or customers sites) to the main hub, and from the main hub to the
delivery address via station offices and regional hubs (Figures 1 and 9). Consumers
normally dropped their shipments at the express centres. On the corporate side,
shipments were collected by couriers from clients’ premises and dropped at a station
office or a hub. In some areas, there were dedicated teams for pickups and
deliveries, while, in others, the same team of couriers performed pickups and
deliveries during different halves of a workday. The couriers had a good first-hand
knowledge of their respective areas, which included unorganized and ill-defined
addresses (Figures 10 and 11).
Figure 10. An Inner City Area of Lahore—Pakistan’s Second Largest City
Figure 11. A Business District of Karachi—Pakistan’s Largest and World’s 7th Largest City.
Source: Dawn.com.
Hazir SubKuch
The Concept
The features of Hazir SubKuch were partly inherited from the Hazir service and the
Yayvo.com venture. Hazir was launched as an after-hours service for shipment
pickups. The service was advertised on the shutters of the express centre so that the
customers were aware of the service if they found the centres closed. The service
also offered a one-hour pickup and delivery window within the main cities besides the
option of time-choice delivery (delivery at the customer’s specified time). Yayvo.com,
‘Yay’ meaning ‘this’ and ‘vo’ meaning ‘that’ in Urdu, was a distinct e-retailing platform
not only providing the items listed on the website, the ‘Yay’ items, but, on request,
sourcing and providing any non-listed item that could be procured, the ‘vo’ items.
What had initially started as the ‘Vo’ part of Yayvo.com eventually took the form of
Hazir SubKuch with an added problem-solving aspect. Let’s position this as the
problem solver. Why are we still thinking just about the procurement part of things––
Mannan.
The Challenges
Mannan and his team were very enthusiastic about Hazir SubKuch as a service that
aimed to go beyond anything TCS had ever done before. The idea that anyone, at
any point in time, could get anything they wanted was remarkable for the team.
However, offering to deliver anything effectively made the demand unpredictable;
what would TCS do if a customer asked for blood, an organ, alcohol or pork? Was
TCS going to deliver it? On the other hand, putting restrictions on anything would kill
the concept. After considerable thought and brainstorming, it was decided that
anything halal and legal could be provided. This still left the order possibilities wide
open and the demand forecasting difficult. If observed in isolation, it seemed to be a
very challenging product; however, there was a realization that the other services
that TCS offered complemented Hazir Subkuch and made it relatively more
manageable. For example, if someone asked for help to move to a new house, TCS
already had home movers. If someone wanted to get a bouquet delivered, TCS had
Sentiments Express for that. There was also a concern that if TCS did not, then Uber
and Careem taxi services,11 having thousands of vehicles enrolled, could move in this
concierge services domain first.
TCS’s middle management was also initially hesitant about the launch as they
thought that the service might not be compatible with the company’s image. Adeel
explained:
A company that took pride in the fact that it was the largest courier company in
Pakistan and catered to 80–90% of the country’s corporate sector would now be
delivering eggs and bread, among other things, to households.
Mannan though stressed that this was a new market, untapped and brimming with
potential. All we need to do is to leverage our strength and we will be the leaders in
the market—Mannan. Eventually, the entire management went on with the idea
rather firmly and Hazir SubKuch went into its soft launch.
The Soft Launch
The service was tested within the organization’s 12,000 people and their social
circles within the main cities. Service requests came to the contact centre through
phone calls or mobile application access. A request was handled by a service
ambassador, who worked out the total price and the way to meet the requests in
coordination with the operations, business and international teams. In complicated
cases, an ambassador could consult the teams for costing and inform the customer
about it later. The ambassador then contacted and gave the details to a supervisor
who operationalized the service delivery through his riders by planning the route,
giving directions and tracking. The hiring of service ambassadors started awhile
back, but its concept fit well with Hazir SubKuch. Service ambassadors were a level
above the typical call centre operators. They were not just order-takers per se but
could provide recommendations to customers, for example, suggesting an
anniversary present. They were selected based on a criterion around general
knowledge, graduation from decent colleges, etiquettes, teamwork and street
smartness. The ambassadors were paid better than standard call centre operators.
During the soft launch, TCS gauged that most requests were for food items. A
distinct request came from a person who was travelling abroad and wanted to
arrange for his daughter’s birthday. The contact centre team suggested and arranged
a cake and presents, to the family’s pleasant surprise. There was also a request in
which a person wanted to have an electronic storage device picked up from his
home, delivered to his office for copying data and get returned to him at a third
location. There were not many unexpected requests though. TCS was receiving
around 250 orders a day, engaging ten to twelve contact centre staff members out of
the total ninety. A study was conducted to help ascertain the optimal and acceptable
price ranges on a sample size of 300 successful surveys.
The word about the service had gotten out during the soft launch. Many people were
aware of the service. A small-scale marketing campaign ran in forms of advertisements
on the company’s vans, express centres and on social media. There was no reasonable
forecast about what the demand would be after full-fledged marketing.
