The parcel problem in residential buildings is solved. Here's what comes next
mart lockers have solved the parcel problem in most well-run residential buildings. The next frontier is what you do with the data they generate.
Smart lockers in residential buildings have largely solved the parcel problem. Residents collect when it suits them. Couriers deliver without needing anyone home. Staff aren't fielding queries about packages left in communal areas. In buildings where smart lockers are installed and working properly, parcel management has gone from a daily friction point to something that simply runs.
That's a meaningful operational win. But it's only the first chapter.
UK parcel volumes rose 7.1% to 4.2 billion items in 2024-25 (Ofcom). The volume isn't slowing. And as parcel management becomes a solved problem in the best-run buildings, the question shifts: what do you do with the data it generates?
A smart locker that's genuinely integrated into a building's operating layer doesn't just handle parcels. It generates a consistent, reliable stream of resident interaction data. Collection times, frequency of use, patterns across the week. That data tells you something about how engaged a resident is with the building more broadly — and engagement, as every retention-focused operator knows, is the leading indicator of renewal behaviour.
The residents who collect parcels regularly are in the building regularly. They're interacting with the space. They're building habits that connect them to the place. The ones who aren't collecting — whose parcels sit uncollected for days — are often the ones who have mentally moved on before their tenancy formally ends.
This is the frontier beyond the basic parcel problem: using the operational data that smart infrastructure generates to understand resident behaviour, intervene at the right moments, and make better decisions about what to offer and how to manage it.
Smart Point gives BTR and PBSA operators exactly that. Our smart lockers handle parcel management without staff involvement. Our operations and analytics platform makes the data they generate visible alongside every other service interaction in the building — amenity bookings, maintenance requests, resident communications — so the picture of resident engagement is complete, not fragmented.
The parcel problem is solved. What comes next is using that infrastructure to run a smarter building.
See how Smart Point works across the full operating layer →
