Back on track

Staff -- Logistics Management, 8/1/2001

Although shippers have complained about the negative impact of rail mergers on service over the past few years, the rails seem to be successfully wooing their customers back. Intermodal traffic has picked up this year, apparently at the expense of truckload freight.

No surprise, then, that our survey should also reflect a renewed confidence in rail carriers. The weighted customer satisfaction score for standard rail service shot up from 28.52 to 30.48 this year. Ratings went up in four out of five categories. The average on-time performance score increased from 8.74 to 9.63, and the value quotient improved from 6.60 to 7.36. Information technology advanced—from 2.30 to 3.14—as did equipment and operations, whose score went from 5.00 to 5.15. Only the customer service score slipped, falling from 5.24 to 5.21.

This year, several rail carriers earned Readers' Choice awards for excellence—in contrast with last year, when only two made the grade. Carriers earning honors this year were Wisconsin Central, Florida East Coast, Canadian Pacific, Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Union Pacific, and Canadian National.

Rail shippers also honored five intermodal marketing companies this year compared with three last year. Earning laurels were Matson Intermodal, C.H. Robinson, Hub Group, Landstar Logistics, and GST Corp. Their weighted score as a group also went up, from 31.41 to 32.62.

The intermodal service providers, too, fared a bit better this year than they did in 2000. Last year, the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway (BNSF) was the sole awardee. This year, Triple Crown (NS/Conrail) and CSX Intermodal joined BNSF in the quality circle. The overall score for this group also moved up, from 28.81 to 31.51.

Rail/Intermodal

Railroads (Standard Rail Service)	On-time performance	Value	Information technology	Customer service	Equipment & operations	Weighted score
Wisconsin Central	11.57	8.21	3.00	5.94	5.63	34.34
Florida East Coast	11.87	8.20	2.84	5.10	5.63	33.64
Canadian Pacific	10.06	7.50	3.04	5.62	5.31	31.52
Burlington Northern Santa Fe	9.88	7.61	3.45	5.30	5.26	31.50
Union Pacific	9.56	7.67	3.36	5.49	5.13	31.22
Canadian National	9.63	7.14	3.08	5.59	5.32	30.76
Average	9.63	7.36	3.14	5.21	5.15	30.48
Intermodal Marketing Companies
Matson Intermodal	11.54	8.57	3.66	6.62	5.83	36.21
C.H. Robinson	10.25	7.88	3.50	6.52	5.33	33.49
Hub Group	10.44	7.89	3.47	6.00	5.32	33.12
Landstar Logistics	10.43	7.57	3.31	6.18	5.56	33.06
GST Corp.	10.24	7.60	3.20	6.36	5.48	32.88
Average	10.25	7.77	3.31	6.00	5.29	32.62
Intermodal Service Providers
Triple Crown (NS/Conrail)	10.44	8.10	3.39	5.72	5.50	33.16
Burlington Northern Santa Fe	10.46	8.27	3.41	5.22	5.28	32.64
CSX Intermodal	10.14	7.71	3.29	5.45	5.00	31.60
Average	9.97	7.75	3.31	5.37	5.10	31.51
All scores are weighted. Weighted scores are determined by multiplying the average raw scores by the average weighted importance of each attribute (1=least important; 5=most important). To find the attributed weights for this category, see the table titled “Performance Attributes’ Importance Ranked by Mode” in the introduction to the Quest for Quality report.