New Executive Council Establishing Less-Than-Truckload Digitalization Standards
Summary
Today, a leading group of transportation executives and thought leaders have announced that they have brought together 20+ organizations to support and evolve the LTL industry. “We’re excited to join other industry leaders to help create a set of standards and best practices that will enable the entire ecosystem to increase performance, meet customer needs and keep our supply chains moving despite unexpected disruptions such as a global pandemic, extreme weather, trade disruptions, closed borders and economic uncertainty.” With the vision of supporting the automation of all shipping and billing workflows from payment to settlement, the council is currently concentrating on developing digital standards that address the most urgent and widespread pain points across the LTL industry. As for the benefits to carriers, they’ll automate or even eliminate certain administrative, bill entry and customer service tasks, saving up to 1.3 percent of their current costs. In addition to eliminating manual data entry and risk of transcription errors, carrier systems receive shipment information sooner enabling advance operational planning and network optimization. Carriers estimate they could realize an additional 2-percent reduction in operational costs, making the industry-wide savings nearly $1.2 billion,” stated Brian Thompson, Chief Commercial Officer at SMC³.