Throughout the course of history, gambling has spawned more than its fair share of interesting tales and anecdotes. But many businesses today are creating gambling anecdotes of their own, by incorrectly guessing consignment weights and dimensions.

Revenue Protection Solution in use.

With shipping costs directly related to profits, for both freight forwarders and shippers alike, is this really an area you can afford to gamble?

Playing a guessing game Having accurate consignment weight and dimension data is critical to the operations of many businesses. However, many shippers find it difficult to accurately weigh and measure freight, usually because they lack the proper equipment to do so.

However, using improper equipment (or in some cases, no equipment at all) to weigh and measure freight leads to incorrect consignment data, which if gone unchecked, means consequent undercharging by the freight forwarder.

Although the shipper might feel like they’ve hit the jackpot by saving a few pounds on their delivery costs, a buildup of under charged consignments can lead to thousands of pounds in revenue losses for the freight forwarder.

Most freight forwarders have a dedicated revenue protection area within each hub, where freight is taken to be weighed and measured, to ensure the consignment details declared by the shipper are accurate. But these separate processing areas create huge bottlenecks in freight processing time. When the focus of express freight operations is to get consignments through the hub in the quickest amount of processing time possible, there is never enough time to check every consignment that passes through.

What happens next is where the gambling begins. Freight is selected for the revenue protection area by an operator who spots an obvious looking discrepancy between the size of the consignment and the stated dimensions. If the freight forwarder finds a discrepancy between the declared and actual weight, the shipper can expect to receive an additional surcharge.

But this method of guesswork sees operators looking for quick wins such as oversized or odd-shaped freight and risks masses of under-declared freight slipping through the system unchecked.

The house always wins

For freight forwarders, the only way to guarantee no under-declared freight slips through the net is to weigh and dimension every piece of freight as it passes through the hub. Luckily, new technologies available within the logistics market now make it affordable to revenue protect 100% of freight.

The Revenue Protection Solution from Avery Weigh-Tronix allows freight forwarders to revenue protect 100% of freight without any major changes to their existing process, by simply scanning, weighing and dimensioning.

This three-step process captures consignment weight and dimensions as part of the natural process of moving freight through the hub, eliminating the bottlenecks that come from having a separate revenue protection area, while ensuring underdeclared consignments are identified and the correct surcharge applied.

1.Scan

The revenue protection process begins with the Cubetape® – a handheld digital dimensioning device which scans the consignment’s barcode, containing information including the consignment ID, customer details and routing data.

2.Weigh

While the consignment is moved throughout the hub, an in-motion weight reading is taken on either an Avery Weigh-Tronix Forklift Truck Scale or Pallet Truck Scale – meaning taking a weight reading is part of the natural process of moving freight through the hub – with no need to move freight to a separate revenue protection area.

Where platform scale use is driven by specific material handling requirements, modern designs enable these to increase efficiency through including the use of ramps or adapting the installation, for example, installing the platform into a pit.

3.Dimension

The Cubetape is then used to take a digital measurement of the consignment (in the same time as a conventional tape), with the length, width and height being paired to the consignment weight and then wirelessly transferred to the hub management system. This digital data capture approach avoids manual data input, which saves time and eliminates human errors.

The consignment data is then cross-referenced against the weight and dimensions declared by the shipper to ensure there are no discrepancies. In the event of an under-declared consignment, the Revenue Protection Solution provides a verified audit trail to support surcharges raised to the shipper, thanks to its Legal-for-Trade status. This technology can also be used by shippers as part of a surcharge protection process, to ensure any outgoing consignments are correctly weighed and dimensioned, avoiding the possibility of unbudgeted surcharges from freight forwarders.

Deal your business the winning hand

No matter if your business deals in heavy and large, ugly, awkward, twoman, or bulky freight – by using the Revenue Protection Solution to check 100% of freight as it passes through your hub, you can guarantee you’re not gambling on guesswork. To learn more about safeguarding your revenue against guesswork, visit averyweigh-tronix.com and search for Revenue Protection.

AVERY WEIGH-TRONIX

www.averyweigh-tronix.com

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