Your first 90 days with a new 3PL

Signing with a 3PL is a great milestone, but it's not the finish line. Once you're onboarded, and live, it's the next 90 days that either cement the partnership, or cause it to fail.

Most issues that end 3PL relationships, such as poor communication, inventory discrepancies, and SLA drift were visible in the first three months. The brands that catch these early can fix them, but the ones that don't end up switching providers, and have to start the whole search process again.

Days 1-30

The first month is about making sure the operational basics are working before you scale anything.

• Verify your inventory on arrival: When your stock reaches the facility, don't assume the receiving count matches what you sent. Compare the 3PL's inbound count against your own records within 48 hours. Any discrepancy above 0.5% should be raised immediately, before stock is shelved and the trail goes cold.
  
  

• Run test orders: Before you open the tap on full order volume, place test orders yourself. Check pick accuracy, packing quality, label accuracy, and how the order appears in your tracking system. Do this across different SKUs, not just your bestsellers.
  
  

• Confirm your integrations are working: Your ecommerce platform, your inventory data, and your order management system should all be talking to the 3PL's Warehouse Management System (WMS) cleanly. Check that stock levels update in real time and that order status flows through correctly. If there's a lag or a gap, find it now rather than when a customer asks where their order is.
  
  

• Establish your account contact: Know who your named contact is, how to reach them, and what the escalation path looks like if something needs resolving urgently. If that isn't clear by the end of week one, make it clear.

Days 30-60

By week five or six, you should have enough order data to start measuring performance meaningfully.

• Pull your first performance report: Check pick accuracy, on-time despatch rate, and dock-to-stock time against the targets in your Service Level Agreement (SLA). Don't wait for the 3PL to send you a summary. Request the underlying data and review it yourself.
  
  

• Look at your customer service tickets: An uptick in "Where Is My Order?" (WISMO) contacts is often the first visible sign that something is going wrong operationally. If your WISMO rate is climbing, trace it back to the fulfilment data before assuming it's a carrier issue.
  
  

• Check your inventory accuracy: Run a spot check on a handful of SKUs. Compare what the WMS shows against what's physically in the facility. A well-run 3PL with an active cycle counting programme should be operating above 99.5% accuracy. If you're seeing meaningful discrepancies at this stage, raise them through the proper channels.
  
  

• Note what's working: It's easy to focus on problems. If your account contact is responsive, if orders are going out cleanly, if the integration is running smoothly, say so. A 3PL that knows you're paying attention and that you recognise good work tends to stay more engaged than one that only hears from clients when something goes wrong.

Days 60-90

By the end of month two, you'll know whether the partnership is tracking in the right direction. Use month three to address anything that isn't.

• Schedule a formal review: Not a check-in call, but a structured conversation with your account contact and, where possible, someone from their operations team. Bring your performance data, and ask them to bring theirs. Compare the two.
  
  

• Raise issues directly and specifically: If pick accuracy has been running below your SLA threshold, say so and ask for a root cause explanation and a remediation plan with a timeline. Vague concerns get vague responses. Specific data results in specific answers.
  
  

• Revisit your packing specifications: After two months of live orders, you'll know whether your packing instructions are being followed consistently. If there are recurring presentation issues, this is the moment to update your specs and confirm the 3PL has retrained accordingly.
  
  

• Assess the communication quality: Are problems flagged to you proactively, or do you find out from customers? Is your account contact across the detail of your operation, or do you have to re-explain context every time you call? Communication quality at 90 days is a reliable indicator of what the relationship will look like at 12 months.

What to do if things aren't working

If performance is consistently below SLA and the 3PL isn't responding with credible remediation plans, don't wait. Document everything in writing: the specific metrics, the dates, the conversations, and the responses. Most contracts include termination-for-cause provisions that allow you to exit without full penalty if SLAs have been materially and persistently missed. You can only use those provisions if you have the evidence to support them.

The first 90 days is also the period where most contracts allow the cleanest exit if things genuinely aren't working. The longer you wait, the more embedded the relationship becomes and the more disruptive a switch will be.

Communication is key

The brands that get the most from a 3PL relationship treat it like any other commercial partnership: they invest time in it, they communicate clearly, they raise problems early, and they give credit where it's due.

A 3PL that knows your business well, understands your seasonal patterns, and has a team that's genuinely familiar with your product will outperform one that's treating you as just another account. That familiarity is built in the first 90 days, or it isn't built at all.

How we can help

At fulfilment.com, we don't disappear once you've signed with a provider. If something isn't working in the early months of a new 3PL relationship, we can help you work out whether it's an easy operational fix, or a sign of something more serious.