Increasing supply chain velocity with combined FTL, yard visibility

As consumer demands around on-time delivery have grown, so too have shipper expectations surrounding real-time visibility. As such, third-party technology providers have amped up their offerings, and the vast majority of freight moving down the highways today is being tracked.

However, that ubiquitous visibility has not yet been achieved when it comes to yard operations. In fact, yards are often characterized by blind spots and bottlenecks due to mismanaged operations and an overall lack of digital processes.

The truth is that issues in the yard can threaten tight delivery windows just as much as issues on the road. Every inefficiency in the supply chain creates a domino effect, but so does every improvement.

The bad news is that the most common operational inefficiencies in yards — chaotic arrival and departure procedures, containers sitting at rest, driver backlogs, and fragmented processes — can easily lead to lost time, driver or container detention fees, and unmet customer expectations. The good news is that all of those issues can be resolved through improved visibility and the implementation of digital processes.

In many instances, over-the-road visibility stops at the yard. This does not have to be the case. Combining OTR data with yard operations information closes the gap and unlocks new opportunities for optimization, ultimately creating a situation in which the combined benefit is greater than the sum of its parts.

The symbiotic relationship between OTR insights and yard operations amplifies the existing benefits of truckload visibility by creating more connected drivers and enabling real-time arrival predictions through geofencing. This enables transfer point efficiencies that were once thought to be impossible.

“Customers who have shipments moving through multiple warehouses or distribution centers can experience a lack of visibility into where their goods are in transit or delays when goods are out for delivery to a facility, due to bad or inaccurate data,” according to project44 Product Marketing Manager Katia Naffa. “Without arrival and departure data on these transfer points, shippers are left with delays that can have downstream implications like accessorial fees, staffing inefficiencies and missed delivery windows.”

To break through that costly opacity, p44 created a suite of solutions that expands visibility into the yard. By utilizing p44’s yard management and full truckload visibility products, shippers can gain a holistic view of inbound and outbound shipments, from pickup to delivery into the yard and to final delivery at distribution destinations.

In addition to providing superior OTR visibility, p44’s predictive ETAs help inform the facilities Appointment Management solution.The predictive ETAs provide real-time data about when a driver will arrive at the facility, if they are on time or running late, against the scheduled appointment time. This allows users to see how a shipment is tracking against its scheduled time.

This groundbreaking level of visibility opens the door to better transfer point efficiencies, more refined supply chain planning and a systematic approach to managing docks and trailers, leading to increased supply chain velocity.

Taken together, full truckload and yard visibility can have a transformative effect on a shipper’s entire supply chain. To tap into those benefits, however, shippers need to look beyond traditional shipment focuses and look to increasing velocity at every transfer point. 

Click here to learn more about how to capitalize on the advantages of optimized yard operations with project44’s solutions.