Periods of severe supply chain disruption in all corners of the world over the past year have highlighted logistics pressure points, one of which is the yard. Despite being ripe for process and efficiency enhancements, through digitization and automation, this key section of supply chains is often overlooked when it comes to investment. This is despite the significant potential for reducing costs associated with increased dwell time, lower driver detention fees and increased throughput.
The challenges facing yards
The yard operation is critical to moving freight in a timely manner, and a lack of operational visibility can lead to bottlenecks. Impacts are exacerbated when dealing with surges in demand caused by seasonality or unexpected events, as well as the market-wide acceleration in e-commerce over the past year, which has caused challenges in sustaining high levels of service for last-mile execution, for example. Additionally, a lack of integration between the separate systems of different teams or functions within a supply chain ecosystem can lead to discrepancies in data, causing confusion, inefficiencies and wasting time.
Without a YMS, organizations may be relying on a good old pen and paper for daily yard checks, then having to spend hours reconciling and updating records. Such paper-based or manual solutions affect accuracy and timeliness of data, and do little to help a common pain point often affecting yard operations - lost trailers. Poor visibility of trailer location costs yard teams time, and in turn impacts dwell, wait and turnaround times. This is at a time when transport budgets are already being squeezed by increasing detention fees and organizations face driver shortages.
Combining the capabilities of yard management systems with the power of real-time transportation visibility
The YMS sits at the intersection of the WMS and transportation management solutions, including TMS and RTTV platforms. YMS complements and improves the planning functions within the management systems by providing executional visibility and automates and integrates logistics processes throughout the yard. And the subsequent process improvements can have significant impacts on productivity thanks to the improved visibility, all without having to invest in hardware related to RFID-based location systems.
Real-time visibility is a key enabler of automation in the yard, as well as the efficiencies that stem from this. As a result, there are a lot of benefits to be gained by deploying a YMS solution and integrating it with Shippeos’ RTTV solution. It offers a complete picture of operations for customers, as well as a more seamless experience for them, in tracing the flow of goods from road, rail or maritime right through to warehouses.
Paired with RTTV, a YMS provides real-time visibility of transport asset locations, and what their live operational statuses are, including dwell time. By monitoring all inefficiencies and delays when a truck visits, it makes it possible to take preventive or corrective actions on the fly. Any available empty trailers can then quickly be identified for outbound loads thanks to up-to-date records of which assets are available. This increases spotter productivity and increases dock utilization. The ‘network view’ achieved through a YMS for supply chain ecosystem partners allows organizations to pool assets, such as empty trailers and yard trucks and to compare operational effectiveness across locations. This creates labor cost savings.
A combined RTTV and YMS solution goes beyond traditional dock management to also incorporate weighing bridges, gates and communication to guide trucks to the right gate. Integration with a RTTV platform means vehicle telematics can pinpoint when a truck is nearing a yard site, providing YMS users with accurate alerts on imminent arrivals. In doing so, the platform can help teams better manage their day-to-day loading and unloading activities for trucks and trailers on site. Self-service kiosks, a yard control tower portal and process automation all help customers make considerable cost savings across administration, detention and demurrage expenses and reduce idle dock labour to boost overall productivity.
With the integration of Shippeo’s real-time visibility data, demurrage costs can be reduced thanks to the anticipation of delays. Better optimized execution and real-time overviews of execution planning enable greater throughput and faster dispatch decisions. In fact, the insight into site operations provided by a combined YMS and RTTV solution enables processes to be optimized, shortening lead times, increasing volume and reducing waiting costs by 85%. In addition, better incoming visibility helps to improve client service experience.
Shippeo Yard Management solution partners
Thanks to Shippeo’s APIs, the platform maintains a high level of compatibility with other systems, including YMS, which makes the platform so useful and flexible for adding future modules and partner integrations. These capabilities help to unlock the benefits of supply chain convergence, breaking down silo walls and boosting collaboration throughout supply chain ecosystems.
Shippeo has joined forces with Peripass, an innovative yard management solutions provider, to offer seamless end-to-end freight visibility and integrated logistics processes across yard and transport operations. Having been selected by major European brands including Tereos, Bridgestone, XPO Logistics, Kuehne+Nagel, Lidl and Intermarché, the Belgian-based yard automation specialist has big growth plans throughout Europe. Partnerships with key market players, such as Shippeo, provide more seamless integrations for customers and create more customized offerings for clients.
For more information on how your organization could take advantage of all the benefits of integrated yard management and real-time transportation visibility systems, get in touch with our team of experts.
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