Boosting Compliance to Increase Freight Visibility & Control with Lipsey Logistics

One of the largest transportation providers in North America, Lipsey Logistics implemented Descartes MacroPoint™ to heighten freight visibility and increase compliance. The 3PL automated multimodal visibility, increased carrier compliance by nearly 20%, and doubled ELD compliance in less than a year—saving a substantial amount of time, money, and manual effort.  

Transporting loads across the US, Canada, and Mexico and delivering emergency supplies as a FEMA-approved carrier, Lipsey relies on real-time freight visibility to optimize delivery operations. The 3PL’s  daily average volume of 1,500-2,000 loads consists primarily of dry van shipments, both full truckload (FTL) and less-than-truckload (LTL), with a mix of reefer and flatbed loads. With carrier tracking compliance stagnant in the 60%-65% range, 44% ELD compliance, and low user adoption, load visibility was compromised. Limited visibility was causing a costly ripple effect across Lipsey’s operations, negatively impacting shipping efficiency, carrier relations, and the customer experience.  

“Descartes MacroPoint dramatically improved carrier and ELD compliance within a short timeframe, helping us keep customers informed of load status and build better relationships with our carrier community. We’re able to leverage real-time visibility data to improve operational efficiency, minimize costs, and inform strategic supply chain decisions.”

- Kim Baldwin, Director of Ecommerce, Lipsey Logistics  

Headquartered in Chattanooga, TN, Lipsey Logistics Worldwide LLC is one of the largest transportation providers in North America. The FEMA-approved Transportation Service Provider (TSP) offers a full variety of transportation solutions through its asset division, Lipsey Trucking, and its third-party logistics company, Lipsey Logistics.  

Lipsey is committed to providing efficient, timely deliveries through surges, seasonal changes, and quarter- or year-end volume spikes. To deliver this level of service, Lipsey depends on Descartes MacroPoint to provide real-time visibility and analytics across its transportation operations. Connecting to an extensive global network of carriers, the Descartes freight visibility solution removes manual load tracking, carrier check calls, and imprecise guesswork from the equation to increase operational efficiency and enhance carrier and customer relationships.  

The Descartes team worked with Lipsey to optimize user adoption of Descartes MacroPoint and apply best practices to increase carrier compliance and improve supply chain visibility. “With carrier compliance languishing below 65%, load visibility was suffering. For example, roundtrip loads with the same pick-up and delivery address were unsuccessfully tracked, leading to low compliance and reduced freight visibility,” said Kim Baldwin, Director of Ecommerce at Lipsey. “With MacroPoint, driver adoption quickly ticked upwards, carrier onboarding improved, and we increased carrier compliance to 82% within a year.” 

Descartes MacroPoint enables Lipsey to view, analyze, predict, and communicate the status of any load in real-time, dramatically improving its ability to manage supply chain disruptions, increase on-time delivery performance, and enhance the customer experience. Carriers can easily connect with the Descartes solution via ELD/GPS, TMS, or mobile app.  

With a large and diverse carrier network, carriers leveraged all the options for sharing visibility, include API connections, the MacroPoint for Truckers App, and the large, connected network of MacroPoint-enabled ELD providers.  As an example, the ELD-based load tracking provides Lipsey with a high level of control, generating predictable ETAs and reducing operational costs (e.g., overtime fees, detention charges, chargebacks) by enabling real-time visibility into freight movement. Status checks, such as arrivals and departures at pick-up and destination locations, and in-transit updates ensure a level of predictability that removes the costly element of surprise from Lipsey’s operational planning efforts.  

“With Descartes MacroPoint, ELD compliance increased from as low as 44% to 88% compliance within four months. This level of improvement saves us hundreds of staff hours, eliminating the manual efforts associated with looking at 1,500+ loads per day,” said Baldwin. “And more importantly, by automating visibility, we know exactly where those loads are for our customers—without having to spend time calling drivers.” 

By optimizing Descartes MacroPoint across its transport operations, Lipsey achieved 82% carrier compliance—an increase of nearly 20% in one year—and catapulted ELD compliance from 44% to 88%. 

With automated real-time visibility and increased ELD compliance, Lipsey has insight into load location and status throughout the freight journey. The 3PL knows in advance if loads will be late and can keep customers informed and offer predictive ETAs. 

Enhanced data insights enable Lipsey to evaluate carrier performance, ensuring operations are low cost and high performance. Seamless carrier onboarding, frictionless connectivity, and real-time visibility help carriers respond proactively to disruptions and support safer working conditions for drivers.  

By automating tracking with real-time freight visibility—plus significantly increasing ELD compliance— Descartes MacroPoint eliminated time-consuming and costly manual load tracking. Automated alerts simplify the tracking workflow and expedite in-transit communications.