Student Housing Business is the voice of the student housing industry.
Issue link: https://studenthousingbusiness.epubxp.com/i/783396
MAIL & PACKAGE DELIVERY StudentHousingBusiness.com January/February 2017 63 "The numbers are staggering," says Heather Sizemore, vice presi- dent of operations for University Student Living (USL). To paint a picture of the problem, Sizemore points to the 640-bed Twenty91 North community in Buffalo, New York, which USL owns and manages. From August 1, 2016 to December 31, 2016, staff received, logged, stored and distributed 7,499 resident packages, which averaged out to 49 packages com- ing into the office per day. "Time is money," Sizemore says. "We realized that our staff is spending valuable time dealing with packages instead of going on campus to market, making fol- low-up phone calls or a number of other critical tasks to assist in leasing up a property." 24-7 Solutions It's common now to see more owners using vendors who spe- cialize in handling the onslaught of incoming packages rather than take it on themselves. USL con- tracted with The Postal Solutions Companies to install and oper- ate Luxer One lockers at all new developments that break ground in 2017 and beyond. Meddin says portfolio-wide installs of some type of package and/or mail management product or service are growing so rapidly that the company, in business since 2000, added six coast-to-coast sales staff in the past six months. Lockers come in various sizes and their modular design enables them to be customized by color and to fit interior schemes. They are touted to be among the more efficient ways to manage packag- es because they allow 24-7, secure access to packages and reduce efforts required of management staff. When a carrier, such as USPS, FedEx or UPS delivers a pack- age to a student housing commu- nity, they bypass the apartment managers completely, access the locker area and log and load each package into a locker. Then, some companies automatically send a one-time code to the student alerting them about the package. The code allows access to retrieve the package. Moreno says carriers complete package delivery in 12 to 15 seconds per package. Other companies, such as Pack- age Concierge, issue an individual code to each student via its mobile app that does not change and is unique to each student. With their own permanent code, students can come to the locker bays any time after receiving a message that a package has arrived and scan their own bar code. Once the code is scanned, all lockers containing a package addressed to that student will open. "We made our technology attach to the person, versus attach to the package," says Georgianna Oliver, founder and CEO of Pack- age Concierge. "This technology component is an especially impor- Campus Evolution Villages in Morgantown, West Virginia, offers package lockers from Package Concierge. Students receive an individual code via a mobile app. With their own permanent code, students can come to the locker bays any time after receiving a message that a package has arrived and scan their own bar code. Once the code is scanned, all lockers containing a package addressed to that student will open.