Amazon Prime Now Aims To Deliver To New Yorkers In One Hour
Amazon Prime has long been a service well worth the money to most subscribers. Now the retail giant is looking to make its delivery service that much better with the announcement of Amazon Prime Now. With Amazon Prime Now, customers in New York City will be able to get their online orders delivered to them within an hour of purchase, thanks to local bike messengers.
The service is not official, but the Wall Street Journal is reporting Amazon Prime Now will be going live relatively soon, according to sources that are close to the situation. This is just the latest perk for the online retailer’s customers, who have long been getting special service. For those who aren’t familiar with all that Amazon offers with Prime, subscribers can get almost anything they order directly from the company delivered to them in two days, and the shipping costs are zero.
The company has also been rolling out other perks over the last few years, including Amazon Prime video, which works quite a bit like Netflix. The big difference between the site’s offering and Netflix is that there is free streaming, but you can also purchase or rent some shows and movies. Subscribers also get access to a streaming music service, the ability to read certain Kindle books absolutely free, and now Amazon is even offering its Prime members a massive amount of online storage space.
Amazon Prime Now is being tested in New York city, and it doesn’t seem like this will ever be a service that is offered in every city in the U.S. The drawback, of course, is that this particular offering will only be available in cities that already have a bike messenger delivery system in place. The retail giant isn’t looking to reinvent the wheel, and likely won’t be installing bike messengers where they don’t already exist.
According to Geek.com, Amazon Prime Now testing includes giving the bike messengers eight-hour shifts and $15 per hour wages. The delivery people are given an address and must deliver a package within an hour. Once they arrive at the residence or building, they need to take a picture and send it back to their base of operations. This is a way for the company to make sure the orders are being delivered inside the time frame they have promised. It seems likely that if Now goes wide scale, it’s going to be one of the most popular features of Amazon Prime.
