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Why all the
interest in TMS?
Warning: if you own stock in a shipping or courier company that
makes its money by overcharging customers, this article could be
hazardous to your financial health. Conversely, if you are a
victim of high shipping costs and inefficiencies, read on…
Once the forgotten child of the supply chain, shipping has
become increasingly important in today’s competitive market.
Delivering products on-time and efficiently can play a key role
in your organization’s overall profitability.
Traditionally, shipping has been a manual process. Workers
manually fill out shipping documents such as waybill and bills
of lading - a highly inefficient process. Some companies have
attempted to improve efficiency by using carrier supplied
shipping systems; however these systems often create disparate
data silos. (Translation: if you have 3 shipping companies’
computers, you have 3 extra duplicate systems to manually
update.)
Fear not – help is at hand in the guise of Transportation
Management Systems. TMS calculate freight costs and generate
necessary shipping documentation such as carrier labels, bills
of lading, and manifests for a variety of different carriers.
Why all the interest in TMS,
you ask?
While the benefits of TMS are varied and plentiful, I have
decided to focus on the four biggest attractions (you’ll
especially like number 4, but don’t skip the others):
The desire to improve
Efficiency is a big factor in drawing companies into
TMS.
Today many shippers work with different carrier supplied
systems. Each system is unique and has different business rules.
TMS standardizes the way you ship. All carriers and packages are
shipped in the same way through the same system.
This allows you
to process more shipments quicker and enhances staff
trainability.
A TMS also has
the benefit of being
Centralized. One TMS can handle all of your shipping
needs. This centralization makes it easier to integrate a TMS
into your core business system. Integration increases the
visibility of shipments throughout your organization i.e..
shipping data like tracking numbers, freight costs, and delivery
information can be passed from the TMS to your core business
system. This data can then be made available to everyone in the
organization.
Similarly, TMS systems can be linked directly to your order
entry system. Destination information, shipping instructions,
and other data can be sent directly to the TMS reducing the
amount of work required to ship a package. It can also minimize
the likelihood of keying or processing errors.
Flexibility
is another benefit. Using a carrier supplied system often locks
you into working with that carrier. TMS works with many carriers
including parcel, LTL, and TL. Therefore, you can load a variety
of carriers into your system, including specialty carriers which
could handle certain parts of your business better.
However, it is the
potential cost
savings that create the strongest attraction
to the TMS (this is the one I said you’d really like). Many
systems offer rating and routing optimization. Some of the more
sophisticated systems can even determine the least expensive
carrier based on a specified service, delivery date, or time. By
ensuring that each shipment is delivered as required, but at the
lowest possible cost, a TMS can have a huge impact on your
bottom line.
By standardizing processes, centralizing information, and
potentially reducing your shipping costs, a TMS is your one stop
shop for all your shipping needs.
With thanks to:
Paul Nascimento,
ERP
Sales Channel Consultant,
Scancode Systems
The Buzzzz -
new concepts you should start learning about
Business intelligence (BI) is the process of
gathering information in the field of business. It can be described
as the process of enhancing data into information and then into
knowledge. Business intelligence is carried out to gain sustainable
competitive advantage, and is a valuable core competence in some
instances.
Prior to the start of the Information Age in the late 20th century,
businesses sometimes took the trouble to struggle to collect data
from non-automated sources. Businesses then lacked the computing
resources to properly analyze the data, and often made business
decisions primarily on the basis of intuition.
As businesses started automating more and
more systems, more and more data became available. However,
collection remained a challenge due to a lack of infrastructure
for data exchange or to incompatibilities between systems.
Analysis of the data that was gathered and reports on the data
sometimes took months to generate. Such reports allowed informed
long-term strategic decision-making. But short-term tactical
decision-making continued to rely on intuition.
In modern businesses, increasing standards,
automation, and technologies have led to vast amounts of data
becoming available, from disparate sources.
BI systems are designed to use the data from
multiple sources to provide meaningful, timely and actionable
information to managers and decision makers - the right
information to the right person at the right time.
For more information, visit
wikipedia.
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