Updated October 2026. Parcel tracking software collects the scan events each carrier sends, translates them into one consistent set of statuses, and shows them to customers on a tracking page and in email or SMS updates that carry the retailer's brand. Shipment tracking software and package tracking software are other names for the same job. Retailers use it to tell customers about a delay before they ask, which cuts "where is my order" (WISMO) contacts.
Once an order ships, the customer starts checking on it. When the only answer is on a carrier's website, written in that carrier's terms, the next stop is often your customer service inbox. Parcel tracking software hands that conversation back to the retailer: one tracking page in your brand, an update when the status changes, and a warning to your team when a parcel stops moving, built on shipment visibility across the carriers you use.
Good delivery also brings customers back. In the 2024 Consumer Home Delivery Report from IMRG, sponsored by nShift, almost 60% of shoppers said a good delivery experience has directly encouraged them to purchase again. Between checkout and the doorstep, customers follow that experience through the tracking page and the delivery updates.
What is parcel tracking software?
Parcel tracking software follows every shipment from label to doorstep across all the carriers a business uses, and turns that data into updates customers and staff can read. It connects to carrier networks for scan events, and to the order management, warehouse and ecommerce platforms that know who ordered what. Shipment tracking software and package tracking software describe the same category; delivery tracking software is the broader name for it.
Inside the business, several teams work from the same events:
- Customer service finds any parcel with one search and answers in the same words the customer sees.
- Ecommerce and CRM teams use the tracking page and delivery emails as a branded channel.
- Logistics teams see which carriers and lanes run late, from the same data.
How do delivery companies track packages?
Delivery companies track packages by scanning the barcode on the shipping label at every handover, and each scan becomes a timestamped event tied to the parcel's tracking number. The label is printed when the order is packed. The first scan happens when the carrier collects the parcel or the retailer drops it at the depot, and from then on the parcel is scanned in and out of every building it passes through: the local depot, the linehaul truck or plane, the regional hub, the delivery depot, the driver's van. Two scans matter most to the customer: "out for delivery", when the driver starts the route, and "delivered", which may come with a signature, a photo or a safe-place note. Problems and exceptions generate their own events too, such as an address query, a missed delivery attempt or a parcel being held at a pickup point.
Each tracking number covers one shipment. The carrier issues it when the label is created. Because the tracking number exists before the parcel moves, "label created" is often the first status a shopper sees. The first physical scan starts the journey through the carrier network. The delivery scan, or the collection scan at a pickup point, closes it.
Tracking becomes less clear in the gaps between scans and when parcels move between carriers. A parcel on a linehaul truck overnight generates no event, so a customer who checks in the morning sees the same status as the night before. Every carrier names its events in its own words and its own language: one carrier's "in transit" is another's "arrived at sorting center", and a Nordic carrier reports the same step in Swedish. Cross-border parcels change hands between two carriers, and the first carrier's last scan and the second carrier's first scan can sit days apart with a customs status in between. A retailer using several carriers can therefore end up with several tracking timelines that read nothing alike, while customer service agents have to learn each carrier's vocabulary to answer the same basic question.
A multi-carrier platform standardizes those different timelines. It receives the carriers' raw events, maps each status to a common category and presents the same set of steps regardless of which carrier has the parcel. nShift Track, for example, has mapped hundreds of different carrier statuses into seven main categories, so customers see a consistent tracking journey across shipments. It can also flag an unexpected gap in tracking events, giving the retailer a chance to investigate before the customer gets in touch. With one platform connecting you to 1,000+ carriers, customers see one timeline and customer service teams learn one vocabulary, however many carriers you add.
What tracking software adds to carrier tracking
Carrier tracking records where a parcel was last scanned; tracking software decides what your customer hears about that scan, in which language, through which channel and at what time.
Show one branded tracking page
A branded tracking page is a page in your own design that shows the parcel's progress in plain steps. In nShift Track you can publish it as a hosted page with your theme, or embed it in your website as a widget so the customer follows the order without leaving your store. The page uses the normalized status names, so a parcel handled by two carriers still reads as one journey. Email notifications can also carry an Apple Wallet pass, so iPhone users can follow the shipment from their Wallet app.
"We ship more than 30,000 parcels a year. Every one of those shipments is a chance to communicate with the customer."
Gustav Höjelid, E-commerce Manager, Galvin Green
Send updates when the status changes
Notifications are emails and text messages that go out when a shipment reaches a status you choose, such as collected by the carrier, out for delivery, ready for pickup or delivered. The triggers use the normalized events, so one rule covers every carrier, and you can still narrow a template to a single carrier or location when one route needs different wording. Templates can be localized by language and country, and you can set hours when no message goes out, so customers are not messaged at night.
Warn the customer when a scan does not arrive
Many delivery questions start with silence: no new scan, so no new status. Advanced notification profiles in nShift Track watch for events that should have arrived and did not, for example no "delivered" scan within three days of "out for delivery". You choose the weekdays your carriers operate, so weekends do not count toward the waiting time. ICANIWILL's COO, Pontus Eriksson, describes what that changes for the team:
"The customer event function means that if something should have happened but didn't, a notification is triggered so we can proactively keep the customer informed of delays or, even better, solve the issue before the customer knows about it."
Pontus Eriksson, Chief Operating Officer, ICIW
Measure carriers on the same events
The events behind the tracking page also feed reporting. Where carriers send return data, carrier performance reports compare actual transit times with the transit times in your SLA, and Customer Experience reports show which shipments were delivered at the first attempt and which carriers needed several tries. Reports keep the carrier's original status next to the normalized one, so any disagreement with a carrier can be checked against the original scan. Galvin Green uses the same delivery data in carrier conversations about shipment quality, delivery volumes and performance.
Which parcel tracking tools improve customer communication for UK webstores?
The parcel tracking tools that improve customer communication let the retailer send the message instead of the carrier: a tracking page in the store's own design, email and SMS triggered by normalized events in the customer's language, and an alert when a parcel stops moving.
Quiz, the UK fashion retailer, built that setup with nShift Track after moving its returns to nShift Returns. At Quiz, branded tracking pages and delivery emails drive engagement rates up to five times higher than traditional marketing messages. Haroun Saleemi, Head of e-commerce at QUIZ, said:
"nShift has significantly improved our post-purchase experience which has reduced calls to our customer service team, improved our brand perception and boosted our bottom line."
Activewear brand ICANIWILL sees the same channel effect: its branded shipping confirmations reach a 25% click-through rate, against an industry average of around 18%.
Cross-border orders add a customs step to the timeline, and that step needs explaining. Galvin Green, a Swedish golf apparel brand with around 75% of its revenue in the US and UK, has seen that a customs-related notification on a shipment leaving the EU can worry customers even when the process is normal. Its branded tracking journey gives the team a clearer way to explain what is happening. UK retailers shipping to customers in the EU meet the same moment from the other side of the border.
How does tracking software reduce "where is my order" calls?
Tracking software reduces WISMO contacts by answering the question before the customer asks it. A WISMO contact usually follows a gap: no update since dispatch, a status the customer cannot read, or a delay nobody mentioned. Proactive notifications fill the silence after dispatch, normalized statuses replace carrier codes with steps a shopper understands, and missing-event alerts let your team speak first when a parcel is late.
ICANIWILL ships around 400,000 orders a year. Since moving its order updates to branded nShift Track notifications, it has seen a 50% reduction in delivery-related questions from its customers.
The contacts that remain usually need a person: a damaged parcel, a changed address, a missed delivery. Agents handle those faster when every carrier's events are in one place. In nShift Track they search by order number, shipment or package number, receiver name or address, and see the full event history plus proof of delivery or a signature where the carrier returns it.
What to look for in delivery tracking software for UK retailers
Compare order and parcel tracking platforms on the parcels that cause contacts: those that change carrier, cross a border or stop moving.
| Check | Question to ask | What the customer gets |
|---|---|---|
| Carrier coverage | Do all the carriers in our mix, including cross-border partners, send scan events into the platform? | One timeline for every order, whichever carrier delivers it |
| Normalized statuses | How many carrier statuses map to how many customer-facing steps? | Plain steps that match what customer service sees |
| Branded tracking page | Can we embed the tracking page in our own website and design? | A tracking journey that stays in your store |
| Event-based email and SMS | Can we trigger messages on any status, per carrier, in each customer's language? | News of dispatch, delivery day and pickup without having to ask |
| Missing-event alerts | Can a notification fire when an expected scan does not arrive, counting only working days? | A message from you before they need to contact you |
| Reporting | Can we report on-time delivery against our carrier SLAs and on first-attempt delivery? | Carrier reviews built on shared numbers |
| Integrations | Does it connect to our ecommerce platform, order management system and warehouse management system? | Every shipment linked to the right order |
The platforms worth a shortlist pass these checks for every carrier you use, including the smaller regional and cross-border carriers in your mix.
Where nShift Track fits
nShift Track is the post-purchase tracking product in nShift's multi-carrier shipping and delivery experience platform. It brings carrier events into one set of normalized statuses, runs your branded tracking page and notifications on them, and reports on how each carrier performs. With nShift Checkout and nShift Returns on the same platform, the delivery promise made at checkout, the updates in transit and the return all draw on the same shipment data.
Laithwaites, one of the UK's leading direct-to-consumer wine retailers, runs shipping, tracking and checkout on nShift:
"With nShift's advanced technology and expertise, we can optimize our logistics processes and provide our customers with more transparency and control over their deliveries."
Laithwaites spokesperson
If your customers still leave your store to find their parcel, start with two changes: put the tracking page on your own site, and turn on an alert for the scan that does not arrive. Put your tracking page and delivery updates in your own brand with nShift Track.
