With changes in customer demands and increased volatility in logistics, there continues to be strong interest, investment and results from implementing real-time freight visibility solutions. Our customers are leveraging Descartes MacroPoint™ to reduce internal costs, improve how they serve customers, and cut detention and chargebacks. Furthermore, customers are tapping into the wealth of visibility data to improve their network and carrier relationships.

Visibility means different things to different people, and there is a tremendous amount of confusion about what is available and how this varies across providers, modes and geographies. Below are 5 critical questions to help you cut through the noise.

The highly demanding and competitive nature of the supply chain industry demands proactive collaboration amongst trading partners in the air freight community. More than ever, organizations not only need to exchange data between disparate systems in an efficient manner, but also require full visibility into each and every shipment and corresponding document. With the right solution, organizations can realize significant gains in internal efficiencies and processes, as well as have the foundations in place to adapt to newindustry initiatives such as the IATA e-freight program.  IATA has been leading the industry e-freight program aimed at taking paper out of the air cargo supply chain to reduce costs and increase efficiency for all participants. e-Freight solutions should enable forwarders, and other parties within the shipment process, to group air shipment interactions including:  Bookings, House and Master Waybills, Shipment Monitoring, Quality Performance Reporting and Customs Filing to provide a central repository that enhances electronic document exchange connections between back-office system and trading partners.

Due to the federally mandated use of Electronic Logging Devices (ELD) in the U.S. and Canada, commercial carriers and fleet operators are investing in telematics technology in order to be compliant. 

Deciding on the best ELD, software platform and technology provider for your company may seem overwhelming, but the solution can create valuable new opportunities once in place.

By selecting the right ELD system and solution provider, the chance of a successful ELD initiative will increase and the ability to extract maximum ROI from ELD investments will improve.

When assessing ELD solutions, these four key components should be assessed:

As the EU puts pressure on the UK Government to put proposals for a new deal in writing within the next two weeks and the Commons leader reported as saying that the Prime Minister was on course to deliver a "fundamentally different" Brexit deal to ensure the UK leaves on October 31st, how closer are we now to a no deal or even if an agreement is reached how different will it be to that presented to Parliament previously and what if any transitional measures will be included for a government who does not want to be tied to the EU Customs Union or Single Market. 

Anyone listening to the radio or driving on the motorways will have heard and seen the constant reminders that the UK will leave the EU on the 31st October and that on the 1st November Freight may change and to check documents.