Service Quality and Customer Relationship Management

Opportunities and challenges

KEX set out our business to serve the ongoing growth of both consumers and sellers in Thailand and connect the demands on both ends. The accelerating advancement of digital technology that offers a variety of payment methods, a series of government economic stimuli, emerging product and service innovations, and a variety of campaigns offered to consumers in Thailand have ultimately resulted in the demand upsurge in the express delivery industry. KEX strives to improve and maintain service quality at a reasonable price to effectively respond to day-to-day demand shifts.

System development and human capital development are crucial to maintaining high service quality in the fast-changing market. Therefore, KEX needs to ensure that the human resources are sufficient and that everyone has been trained as service-minded employees. It is the challenge that KEX must continuously work on to optimise our resources and level up customer satisfaction.

Management strategies and approaches

Enforcement of the Quality Procedure

KEX enforces the Quality Procedure throughout its operation procedure, from first-mile and transit stages to last-mile delivery. Our Quality Assurance Team (QAT) consistently communicate with, control, and spot-check the operation according to the Quality Procedure. The QAT also inquire customers about their satisfaction and any problems found in KEX services and submit the operation performance reports to the management once a week. The Quality Procedure and the inspection plan under the Quality Procedure also cover our franchised parcel shops.

Human resource management

KEX places great emphasis on attracting and retaining talented people by giving competitive incentives. KEX also consistently develops career development plans and regularly conducts employee performance reviews, including the employees of our partners that open Kerry Parcel Shops with us, to support the ever-changing needs of our customers.

KEX adopts the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in terms of operation quality and service quality control. This includes giving special incentives to personnel that excel in our KPIs and imposing penalties for non-compliance with the Quality Procedure. These practices are adopted to ensure the best customer experience.

Network and system design for quality optimisation

KEX has a team of data analysts who analyst consumer needs for effective internal system administration and offer products and services tailored to meet consumer demand. The data analyst team assess and forecast consumer needs in each period and present the results to the management for further strategies.

Investment in research and development

KEX has established in-house testing labs where we analyse and test new products and services before launching. An integrated team work together to target sampling groups, evaluate risks and consumer satisfaction, and draw up guidelines for collaboration.

Emphasis on customer experience

In customer relationship management, KEX is the first Company to offer an on-demand call centre via LINE, Facebook, and chatbots, as we highly value customer experience. Call centre officers are professionally trained to provide personalised assistance and solutions for general issues. Complex matters that require specialised expertise are handed over to the relevant teams. To quickly solve customers' issues, KEX requires a response to customers within 15 minutes. All issues are handled within the respective periods designated in our Quality Procedure, depending on each issue's complexity.

Moreover, KEX is the first and only service provider to offer a loyalty programme called Kerry Express Loyalty Club, enabling customers to earn points when purchasing KEX services. The customers can redeem the points for shipping discounts or other privileges. KEX has also provided business development training sessions for the retail business owners who are the members Kerry Express Loyalty Club.

Tools to measure customer satisfaction and service experience

KEX measures customer satisfaction with its express delivery services and delivery personnel via the Kerry Express application. Data obtained from our application is collected and presented to the management to further improve our services. Positive ratings and feedback on delivery personnel are used to determine incentives for each employee to boost employee morale and control the quality of the delivery personnel.

In 2022, KEX is developing a tool to determine customer satisfaction under the concept of brand loyalty. The tool is expected to be launched by the fourth quarter.

ผู้นำด้านคุณภาพการให้บริการ

<2.5%

พัสดุส่งคืน

99.99%

พื้นที่บริการจัดส่งพัสดุในประเทศภายในวันถัดไป

96.10%

การจัดส่งพัสดุตรงเวลา

2.7+ ล้าน

ความสามารถในการรองรับพัสดุต่อวัน

Note: Data as of the end of December 2022

The service quality measurement demonstrates our achievement of the goals outlined in our 2022 business strategy. However, the on-time delivery goal was slightly underachieved due to the leap in consumer demand during the government's work-from-home policy.

Cybersecurity and data privacy

Opportunities and challenges

As Thailand's market leader in express delivery with over 20 million customers in the present with the growing number of end-users, KEX is committed to offering services that meet customer demands through investments in new technologies and innovations. For example, we are the first service provider to offer Payment on Delivery, parcel tracking via the Kerry Express application, and Door-to-Door Service. Therefore, we place great importance on building a highly secure and reliable database system and ensuring that customers' data remain confidential without any misuse to maintain our status as a reliable and trustworthy brand for all users.

Management strategies and approaches

KEX has established a cybersecurity and data protection system to safeguard personal data and meet our goal of becoming Thailand's most trusted courier service provider without doubt.

Since the start of our operation, KEX has implemented IT security policies and measures and initiated a three-year roadmap to test, develop, and monitor our security system in compliance with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) standard and applicable laws in Thailand and overseas. The Information and Communications Technology (ICT) team develop and maintain the system, assess risks, and devise work plans and preventative schemes. These strategic plans are revised every quarter. The plans and end results are presented to the Deputy CEO and the Board of Directors regularly.

KEX values technological development through closed innovation. We invest in human and technological resources to internally develop applications, databases, and innovations within the organisation to limit the involvement of external service providers. Hence, innovations created and offered by KEX are our intellectual properties.

In addition, our ICT division has developed an integrated assessment model to regularly evaluate the potential risks and test the IT system security, such as cyberattack scenarios, simulated time frame for post-cyberattack data recovery, business continuity plan, additional data centres for data backup, a mandate for employees to set up passwords in their personal laptops, and user verification before accessing information technology systems and customers' personal information. We continuously raise awareness among all employees through communication, including the first-day orientation and the mandatory assessment that all employees must take at least once a year.

From 2019 until now, KEX has been assessed and certified under ISO27001 (Information Security Management System-ISMS).

If KEX needs to outsource IT work or use an external data storage, KEX strictly ensures that the service provider meets the requirements of the applicable international standards, and these third parties must be officially certified.

For example, KEX only relies on the data centre service providers with the TIA-942 standard and ISO 27001:2013, ISO/IEC 20000-1, ISO22301, and CSA STAR (for cloud storage solutions). KEX also considers the service providers' environmental impact mitigation and energy management standards, such as ISO5001 Energy Management. Moreover, the service providers must implement monitoring systems and submit reports to KEX on the access to the stored information so that KEX can detect any abnormality and assess the probability of data leakage or cyberattack.

As for general service providers and subcontractors, KEX requires both parties to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) before commencing any business collaboration.

Apart from cybersecurity, since 2018, KEX has assigned the Quality and Risk Management team to research and prepare the personal data protection policy in accordance with Thailand's Personal Data Protection Act 2019 and the Company's roadmap. In addition to legal compliance, KEX also seeks to become the leader in the express delivery industry, widely entrusted by the customers that KEX will not use the customers' personal data without their consent and that KEX handles confidentiality carefully.

Accordingly, the operation in the previous year covered the implementation of policies, building the relevant governance structure of the Board of Directors and the Audit Committee, circulating internal and external communications to streamline the best practices and address users' rights, and conducting data classification so that only designated and authorised person can access the data. In addition, the Quality and Risk Management team must regularly assess risks and report the assessment results to the Risk Management Committee, the Audit Committee and/or the Board of Directors.

Due to the increasing cyberattack cases since 2020, which were accelerated by the remote working policy during the Covid-19 pandemic, the Risk Management Committee have decided to impose the highest surveillance measure on cybersecurity and confidentiality risks. Therefore, KEX has never experienced any complaint, dispute, or litigation on data breach (zero breach case and zero substantiate complaint).

Innovation Management

Opportunities and challenges

KEX maintains its position as the leader and No.1 in express delivery business to serve Thailand's growing e-commerce and social commerce. Customers' lifestyles have been changing along with the advancement of digital technology. The transition from being only a regular express delivery business to also being an all-in-one logistics platform, using the internationally recognised high technology and work system, is the challenge that pushes KEX to constantly evolve and invest in technology and innovation development.

Management strategies and approaches

In addition to our technological and innovation development as a part of our three-to-five-year business strategy, KEX has also allocated a 5-10 % of its IT budget to training and research and development (R&D) projects. The Product Research and Development team consists of the Product Development team and the User Experience team. The Product Research and Development team is responsible for driving product research and development plans and testing products before launching.

Apart from setting up an internal team dedicated to R&D, KEX also cooperates with leading organisations specialised in different areas to develop mutual business benefits and innovations, such as the strategic cooperation with Sabai Technology Public Company Limited, which offers a complete e-payment platform Kerry Wallet. This online wallet is set to be launched within 2022. Another notable instance is the joint venture with Betagro Public Company Limited to offer the leading cold delivery platform by adopting internationally recognised state-of-the-art technology. These partnerships align with KEX's medium-term business strategy to constantly expand its footprint into new branches of businesses with the business partners, resulting in a sustainable value throughout the supply chains of KEX and its partners.

Last year, KEX launched an internal innovation promotion programme by inviting employees to develop and pilot innovative solutions to help the Company reduce costs, increase sales, and improve service quality. One of the criteria besides business needs is that these investments must positively impact the society and the environment. The Company has allocated a budget for selected innovations that would be adopted.

Kerry Express Tree Box is an example of such innovations in the second half of 2021. KEX is the first and only express delivery provider that offers this service. KEX tree boxes have been specifically designed for fruit and tree shipment and to be environmentally friendly. Our tree boxes are made of thinner paper to minimise the pulp mixture but still maintain exceptional strength, durability, and humidity-resistant capabilities. The boxes are offered to customers at an affordable price to ensure an exceptional service experience. Since its launch in July 2021, approximately 470,000 have been sold.

We remain committed to exploring eco-friendly and innovative packaging solutions by conducting feasibility studies and discussions with domestic and international service providers. These operations cover recycling, repurposing, and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). Our trusted partners must be certified by relevant environmental institutes or organisations and submit operation reports to the Company.