On-time delivery isn't on-time delivery: the SLA shape problem
Average on-time rate is the most misleading number in last-mile logistics. P95 tells you what your customers actually experience.
Every last-mile vendor advertises an on-time delivery rate. Most cluster between 95% and 99%. Almost none of those numbers tell you what you need to know.
The shape matters more than the average
Two carriers can both report 97% on-time. One has a tight distribution: when something is late, it’s late by 5 minutes. The other has a long tail: 3% late, but the tail goes to 6 hours. The customer experience is wildly different. The cost-to-serve when those tails go wrong is wildly different.
P95 is the number that matters
We track P95 lateness across the Dispatch network. For enterprise tier, P95 is under 12 minutes late. For the best comparable carriers we benchmarked, P95 is 47 minutes. Same average. Different business.
Ask vendors for the curve
When you evaluate a delivery partner, ask for the full lateness distribution, not the headline. If they can’t produce one, that’s the answer.