Plan for phased implementation
Another way to reduce overcapacity is to plan for a staged installation. Your system can grow as your throughput grows, making staged implementation more financially sound than an implement-once design. It’s a flexible approach in which knowledge and experience gathered along the way can assist determinations of capacity.
An implementation phase in sortation systems typically covers a 5 year period. However, there’s nothing stopping a hub from revisiting the period as required. A hub’s better-than-expected growth rate may, for example, require an installation that was planned over three phases to be fast-forwarded to two phases.
Read more: “Automated parcel sorting – an introductory guide.”
Take, for example, a courier, express, parcel (CEP) operator who forecasts a 20-30% increase in throughput over the next 5-10 years. This operator could be looking to install a sortation system that can handle 40,000 items per hour to deal with this projected growth. But at the time of installation, the operator’s peak period is limited to 1-2 months of the year. Operating a system capable of handling that volume would see just 30% of the capacity utilised for the rest of the year, making this substantial investment risky. An alternative and agile option is to install a system that handles half that volume during its first phase. Review phase one, implement phase two and so on; the ‘stretch and grow’ approach.