FarEye Highlights Carrier Data Gaps as Last-Mile Costs Rise
FarEye has highlighted unreliable carrier data and disconnected delivery systems as obstacles to controlling last-mile logistics costs, as its latest regional research points to mounting pressure on delivery budgets.
The company’s Eye on the Last Mile EMEA 2026 report, covering Europe, the Middle East and Africa, found that delivery costs rose by a typical 9% over the previous year, with 96% of surveyed firms paying more per delivery. FarEye’s announcement says the research draws on more than 4,000 data points from over 500 respondents.
For sustainability teams, the findings raise a practical question: can better coordination of delivery networks reduce wasted journeys while improving service? The potential exists, but cost savings and environmental improvements require separate measurement.
Disconnected Information Adds Operational Complexity
The last mile is the final stage of a delivery, taking goods from a distribution point to their destination. It can involve a retailer’s own vehicles, external carriers, or a combination of both.
FarEye describes the hidden expense of disconnected carriers, information, and systems as a “fragmentation tax”. Among fully outsourced firms surveyed, 51% identified unreliable carrier information as their biggest challenge, compared with 22% citing cost.
The operational implication is that outsourcing transport does not remove the need to manage it. A shipper still needs dependable information about where orders are, whether delivery commitments are being met, and why exceptions occur.
For example, if carriers use different definitions for an unsuccessful delivery, comparing their performance becomes difficult. A common data structure could help teams distinguish an incorrect address from an unavailable recipient or a capacity problem, allowing each issue to receive an appropriate response.
Reliability Matters Alongside Speed
The report’s public landing page highlights a mismatch between delivery services offered and perceived customer priorities. While 43% of respondents offer same-day delivery, only 11% identify speed as what customers value most.
This suggests businesses should test whether their delivery promises reflect customer needs and operational constraints. Predictable arrival windows could give planners more flexibility to combine nearby stops, whereas a narrow express commitment may limit consolidation.
That is an operational opportunity rather than proof that slower deliveries always produce lower emissions. The result depends on shipment density, vehicle choice, routing and whether customers accept the available delivery windows.
For procurement teams, carrier selection should therefore consider delivery reliability and data quality alongside the quoted transport rate. An inexpensive service can become more costly if it generates repeated attempts, customer enquiries or manual investigations.
AI Adoption Depends on Usable Data
Supply Chain Digital’s coverage reports that 69% of surveyed teams are building with AI, while only 18% are operating it at scale. It identifies skills, trust, data quality, and uncertain returns as barriers.
FarEye markets routing software that considers vehicle capacity, driver schedules, delivery windows, and other service requirements. The company says its system can coordinate owned, hybrid, and outsourced fleets and connect with warehouse, transport, and carrier systems.
Such tools can support planning, but implementation needs to address the information entering the system. Missing vehicle details, inaccurate addresses, or delayed delivery updates can undermine recommendations.
A practical deployment would begin with a defined task, such as improving route allocation in one delivery area. Managers could compare actual outcomes against a documented baseline before extending automation. Human review remains useful when recommendations encounter unusual conditions or conflict with service commitments.
Where Environmental Benefits Could Arise
FarEye’s sustainability offering includes tracking distance and fuel consumption, prioritizing electric vehicles and scheduling deliveries around existing routes and fleet capacity. These are vendor-described capabilities, rather than independently demonstrated results from the EMEA survey.
The potential environmental benefit is straightforward: avoiding unnecessary kilometres or repeated delivery attempts can reduce the transport activity needed to complete an order. However, the scale of any improvement depends on the vehicles and energy used.
Electrification also introduces planning constraints. FarEye describes EV routing functionality that takes charging locations into account. In practice, a suitable delivery plan must accommodate the vehicle’s operating requirements as well as the customer’s delivery window.
Businesses should evaluate these changes using both total emissions and emissions per successful delivery. An improvement in efficiency per parcel can coexist with higher overall emissions if delivery volumes grow sufficiently.
Delivery Challenges Across Food and Industrial Supply Chains
HelloFresh, Papa John’s International and Tata Steel appear in the source publication’s accompanying company section. They illustrate different delivery models, although their inclusion does not establish participation in the survey or verified results from the technology discussed.
For HelloFresh, coordinating home deliveries involves managing fulfilment schedules and the requirements of perishable food. Papa Johns operates a restaurant delivery model in which order allocation, journey times and customer communication are practical considerations. Tata Steel faces a different distribution challenge, involving industrial shipments, vehicle capacity and delivery commitments to business customers.
Tata Steel belongs to the wider Tata group, whose principal investment holding company and promoter is Tata Sons. Individual Tata companies operate under their own boards. This relationship provides corporate context and does not indicate that Tata Sons participated in FarEye’s research.
Across these sectors, the appropriate measures of delivery performance differ. Food businesses may prioritize freshness and timely arrival, while industrial suppliers must also accommodate shipment size, handling requirements, and customers’ production schedules.
Measure Results Across Carrier Networks
Smart Freight Centre’s Global Logistics Emissions Council Framework provides a consistent approach to measuring and reporting logistics emissions. Such an approach can help businesses compare transport activity across providers using a common accounting basis.
For a delivery improvement project, useful operational measures include kilometres travelled, fuel or electricity consumed, first-attempt success and vehicle utilization. These should accompany cost and service indicators.
Carrier contracts can support this work by specifying the activity information suppliers must provide, how frequently it is updated and how missing records are handled. Teams should also document changes in delivery volumes and service areas when comparing results.
FarEye’s findings identify coordination and information quality as priorities for delivery operators. For businesses pursuing net-zero targets, the practical opportunity is to connect those operational improvements with transparent emissions accounting and verify whether changes reduce the footprint of the delivery network.
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