While Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart already enforces strict guidelines for shipping time frames and delivery compliance, its suppliers will be held to even higher expectations in 2017, according to Supply Chain Brain.
Here are three things to know.
- Wal-Mart first created its delivery compliance standards in 2010 when it set a "must arrive by date" for all products and gave suppliers six months to comply. The company's current guidelines create a four day delivery window, allowing products to arrive two days before or after the expected date.
- If suppliers fail to deliver the product in this delivery window 10 percent or more of the time, they are charged 3 percent of the cost of goods of all non-compliant deliveries,, according to the report.
- Starting in February, Wal-Mart will tighten the delivery window to just two days — a product must arrive on the scheduled date or the day before — and boost the delivery compliance requirement from 90 percent to 95 percent.
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