Shoppers still want their orders fast, but they are increasingly judging retailers on whether parcels turn up when promised and how clearly problems are communicated when they do not. New survey data by Locus suggests the race to be the quickest is giving way to a more demanding test: can brands make delivery performance predictable and transparent at scale?
Speed Becomes Baseline, Not Benchmark
Locus surveyed 1,000 consumers across the U.S. and U.K. in November 2025 and found that rapid fulfillment has become the minimum expectation rather than a premium feature. Nearly two-thirds of U.S. respondents said two-to-three-day shipping should be the standard for e-commerce orders. In the U.K., more than 80% of shoppers expect to receive online purchases within four days.
That expectation sits alongside a heightened sensitivity to how orders actually arrive. In the U.S., 93% of shoppers said a retailer’s delivery performance directly shapes how they view the brand overall. That places last-mile execution in the same reputational bracket as product quality and customer service. Industry studies in recent years have echoed this pattern, reporting that delivery outcomes have become one of the strongest drivers of repeat purchase behavior in online retail.
Yet few shoppers fully trust the promises they see on product pages. Fewer than one in ten respondents said retailers consistently meet fast or guaranteed delivery commitments, with only 9% of U.S. consumers and 7% in the U.K. reporting that such pledges are reliably honored. That gap between marketing promises and operational performance is widening just as same-day and next-day options proliferate.
These findings track with broader e-commerce trends: parcel volumes remain elevated post-pandemic, and networks are under persistent pressure from tight labor markets, higher transportation costs and volatile demand patterns. Many retailers have shortened published lead times to stay competitive, even as congestion, capacity constraints and weather disruptions add risk to the final mile.
Returns, Visibility And The Cost Of Missed Promises
The survey highlights how fragile the post-purchase experience remains, especially around returns. Among U.S. respondents, a quarter cited paying for return shipping as the most aggravating part of the process. U.K. shoppers reported a similar hierarchy of concerns, with return fees topping the list, followed by delays in refunds and procedural friction around printing labels, packaging and drop-off.
Those pain points land at a time when many retailers are tightening return policies to protect margins. Various industry reports show a steady rise in restocking fees, shorter return windows and more selective free-return offerings. That creates a delicate balancing act: cost control on one side, and rising consumer expectations for convenient, low-friction returns on the other.
On the delivery side, visibility remains both a pressure valve and a weak spot. More than 90% of U.S. shoppers in the Locus survey said proactive updates help blunt the frustration when shipments run late. Timely notifications about delays, revised delivery windows and driver progress can prevent calls to contact centers and reduce the odds that customers abandon future orders.
Even with better tracking tools, reliability problems are widespread. In the U.K., 94% of respondents said false ‘delivered’ notifications were their most frustrating experience, far outpacing other issues. In the U.S., missed delivery windows ranked as the top last-mile complaint. Both issues create extra work across the network: additional delivery attempts, investigation of lost or mis-scanned parcels, and more customer support interactions.
Peak season does not appear to buy retailers much leeway. More than half of U.S. shoppers told Locus they expect holiday orders to arrive just as quickly as at other times of year, or even faster. That leaves operations teams trying to hold normal service levels while handling the highest volumes of the year, often with temporary staff and constrained capacity.
Nishith Rastogi of Locus framed the challenge as delivering at scale without eroding trust or wasting resources. When a delivery fails, the impact extends beyond a disappointed customer to extra miles on the road, higher failed-attempt costs and avoidable emissions. Many retailers and carriers are responding with investments in dynamic routing, granular delivery time windows, automated notifications and tighter collaboration with parcel partners to cut error rates and improve predictability.
What Comes Next For Last-Mile Strategy
As delivery reliability moves alongside speed in consumer expectations, last-mile decisions will increasingly be judged on how they reduce uncertainty as much as how they cut transit time. That is likely to favor investments that improve address accuracy, data sharing and exception handling over yet another round of headline-grabbing speed promises, particularly for retailers trying to fund these upgrades without adding more pressure to already thin fulfillment margins.
