A new bill of lading hits the scene

By Ray Bohman -- Logistics Management, 8/1/1999

Since the trucking industry's National Classification Committee (NCC) revised its two bill of lading formats in late 1997 and early 1998, all has been pretty quiet on the bill of lading front--at least until now.

Back in early February, a group of major manufacturers and retailers that use electronic data interchange (EDI) on a regular basis completed development of a new, voluntary form known as the VICS Standard Bill of Lading Form. (VICS stands for Voluntary Interindustry Commerce Standards.) The target implementation date is January 2001; however, some major corporations, such as Target stores, are asking their vendors to begin using the new form as soon as possible.

The new form's proponents hope to expand the bill of lading's traditional function--that of serving as a contract of carriage and a receipt for goods--to include providing the shipper, carrier, or consignee (customer) with all of the essential information they need for processing goods through the supply chain. More and more, the bill lading is being used for the scheduling and recording of shipments, as well as to provide input to carrier EDI transactions.

There are actually two new bill of lading forms--one for LTL shipments and the other for truckload shipments. The forms are identical except for a paragraph inserted near the lower left-hand corner of the bill of lading, beginning with the word RECEIVED. The wording of the paragraph for truckload shipments is shorter than the verbiage used in the form for LTL shipments.

Basically, four key elements have been added to the new standard bill of lading forms that are not found in the two most recently revised bill of lading forms--the Uniform Straight Bill of Lading and the Straight Bill of Lading-Short Form.

They changes are as follows:

- Space is provided in the top right-hand corner for inserting a unique bill of lading number, and right below that, space is available to affix a bar code containing that number.

- If the shipment is an LTL shipment and a PRO number is used, use of the SCAC/PRO (SCAC means Standard Carrier Alpha Code) is also recommended to allow more accurate capture of data. Space for affixing a SCAC/PRO bar code is provided in the third box down from the upper right-hand corner of the bill of lading.

- In a new CUSTOMER ORDER INFORMATION section located about a third of the way down on the bill of lading, space is provided for listing each customer order number included in the shipment, along with a separate listing of the number of packages, weight, and number of pallets or slipsheets, for each purchase order number.

- Space is provided for listing the consignee's location number in the SHIP TO section of the bill of lading.

If you would like more information about the new VICS bill of lading, including sample forms (a few of which are actually filled out to show what completed forms look like) and the guidelines--a total of about 35 pages--you can visit the VICS Web site (www.vics.org).

In the meantime, don't throw out any bills of lading you are currently using. They are still perfectly good, and you may continue to use them in the future, particularly when you ship to the many customers who are not, or probably will not be, involved with the new VICS Bill of Lading.

If, on the other hand, your company is a vendor to such major corporations as Wal-Mart, Federated, or Dayton Hudson, you may soon need to supplement your supply of bills of lading with copies of the new form--either the truckload or the LTL version.

Ray Bohman is a well-known consultant and author. Mr. Bohman is editor of several highly successful newsletters on transportation and is a consultant to a number of national trade associations. He is president of The Bohman Group, consultants and publishers in the freight-transportation field. His offices are located at 27 Bay Lane, Chatham, MA 02633. Phone: (508) 945-2272.