Initial Situation
The customer is responsible for the scheduling and handling of all truck transports in the Federal Republic of Germany. Approximately 4500 shipments are dispatched annually. The trade fair offices at the various locations were responsible for booking the transports themselves. This meant that the shipments were distributed decentrally to the available capacities.
Another major challenge was the tracking of shipments and the lack of a Track+Trace system that would have made this possible.
In order to not only centralize but also digitize and thus optimize the processes in the dispatching department and to design a possible T+T solution, tep-IT GmbH was brought on board as a partner. For this optimization, the following objectives had to be met in the first step:
- Compilation of all previously used, relevant truck contractors (in the following "Contractors").
- Obtain prices from the contractors for relevant relations
- Format and store prices
- Determine preferred contractors
- Determine allocation guidelines
- Determine customer's personnel for central dispatch
- Design and implement software application for allocation
Solution
tep-IT
tep-IT received an order with the following objective:
- Adaptation and implementation of a process-optimizing software solution
- Consulting
- Assistance with the selection and set-up of a contractor pool
- Alignment of the contractors with the customer's compliance guidelines
- Conversion of contractor prices into relevant tariff formats
- Tracking (Track+Trace) of shipments
Customer
The client was simultaneously tasked with the following:
- Obtain pricing from relevant contractors
- Determine the compliance guidelines for the contractors
- Programming of an interface from the own system to the new execution application
Result
tep-IT developed and modified the Transport Execution Platform. Among other aspects, a list of over 1000 contractors already used by the customer was compiled on this platform. Where available, the previously used routes were also assigned to them.
The prices obtained from the contractors were stored as tariffs and used as a basis for assigning the various transports to the contractors according to their routes. This proved to be difficult at the beginning, since either the contractors did not want to drive at the prices or the prices were too high for the customer. So, despite the possibility of automatic assignment via the Transport Execution Platform, the transports were assigned manually. At this time, tep-IT also took over the entire Track+Trace of the transports and maintained regular, intensive contact with the various contractors. They were also trained by tep-IT on the system in order to be able to store the relevant data themselves and to carry out the T+T themselves.
After the transfer of the Central Dispatch, the process of tariff setting and allocation described above was initiated again. This time with success. The process of matching the shipments to be assigned to the routes/prices stored in the system was started. This resulted in a kind of "semi-automation". In this step, the assignment was still done manually, whereby the preferred contractors were taken into account first. In the next step, all contractors (with the corresponding route) and then also spot market contractors without stored prices were considered. At this time, the customer also took over the Track+Trace themselves. For this purpose, tep-IT developed a Track+Trace app and made it available to the cotractors.
Step by step, a handful of contractors were set up in such a way that the automatic assignment already planned by tep-IT could now be started. For this purpose, depending on the route and the corresponding prices, the transport order to be awarded was automatically sent to the contractor. The contractor then had the task of independently accepting and executing or rejecting the order via the system. In case of rejection, the order was sent directly to the next relevant contractor.
Benefits
The following benefits were achieved for the customer:
- 60-70% fully automated dispatching
- the entire central disposition is now carried out by a few employees
- more order volume due to more efficient processes
- more intensive cooperation between the customer and contractors
- tracking and control through functioning Track+Trace system via app
- drastically increased service for the end customer ( not at least by a customer center developed by tep-IT, where customers themselves can keep track and see the status of each shipment)
Conclusion
In cooperation with the customer, tep-IT GmbH developed a Transport Execution Platform that now enables the customer to assign all truck transports to its contractors fully automatically. Furthermore, the customer now has full control over the status of each shipment through a Track+Trace system via app, which also operates automatically.
The fully automated and digitalized process optimizations now allow the customer to further expand its business volume in the trade fair sector thanks to freed-up capacities.