Tech giant, Amazon, asked for the keys to your locked house last year so that packages could be delivered straight inside your home. Starting from April, Amazon will take it a step further and deliver packages to the trunk of your car.
Amazon has partnered with General Motors and Volvo to give couriers access to your vehicle in order to place your package in your car. Rather than the use of smart locks and a cloud-connected camera to gain entry, Amazon wants to use the connected technologies embedded in many modern vehicles today.
After purchasing an item and selecting in-car delivery, Amazon will send a series of notifications letting you know the status of your package. At any point, you can choose to change delivery locations or “block access” to the car in the Key app, if your car won’t be immediately accessible to the delivery person. Amazon will then default to your backup delivery location if access to the vehicle is blocked. To find your car, Amazon’s couriers will have access to its GPS location and license plate number, as well as an image of the car.
“I think what we’re doing in the U.S. with Amazon will be even more seamless and the adoption will be stronger,” Atif Rafiq, chief digital officer at Volvo Cars, “for Volvo owners this is another way to take advantage of how they can use the car.”
Customers won’t be able to get in-car deliveries if they park inside gated and underground parking garages where satellite signals often can’t penetrate. Those who leave their vehicles in the lots of large, easily accessible suburban office parks seem to benefit most from this service.
Car owners may be rightly concerned about the valuables in their car, as receiving an Amazon package in their car when they’re not present could make them a target. Amazon said customers shouldn’t worry — “If the damage is caused by a delivery and a customer calls, we will make sure it’s right,” stated Rohit Shrivastava, general manager of Amazon Key.