Reliable Foods lives up to its name (page 2)
-- Logistics Management, 7/1/2005
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Page 2 of 2 Priaulx used the "train the trainer" approach, first teaching other company managers how to use the system, and then having them train drivers. "Some drivers struggled with it for two or three months, but others had it down in a day," he says. More than once during the implementation, drivers expressed concern about time measurement. They worried, for example, that they would get in trouble for not moving a delivery up a flight of stairs within a specified timeframe. To quell their fears, Priaulx explained how increased visibility would take the guesswork out of deliveries and help the company learn exactly how long it did take to get up that flight of stairs. A year later, the on-board computers have been removed from the trucks, and all 16 drivers have grown accustomed to using the system. Overall, Priaulx says, the implementation went smoothly, and even drivers who were at first reluctant to embrace the new system have come to appreciate it. An Unqualified SuccessPriaulx considers the tracking system to be an unqualified success. Delivery accuracy has improved and Reliable Foods now saves an average of one hour per day, per route. The ability to make service adjustments based on real-time information, moreover, has reduced the burden on the customer service staff. "The customer service benefits alone justify [the implementation]," he says. Among those new capabilities are single-call problem resolution; faster response times, thanks to real-time delivery visibility and exceptions management; estimated time of arrival lookup through the Web; and a single source for business intelligence reporting. Dispatchers also have a clearer view of the day's delivery progress. "Our dispatcher can go to the website and use a color-coded and graphically enhanced screen to see exactly where a specific driver is at any time," Priaulx says. "In the past, we'd go all day not really knowing what the drivers were doing, but now that we have real-time data and GPS functionality, we can see everything," he adds. "If someone switches their route around, we see it right when it happens." Priaulx hasn't yet measured the financial benefits of the implementation, but is confident that they have been significant. The fact that the system provided dramatic visibility improvements without requiring additional hardware or software is benefit enough, he adds. Still, the IT manager sees potential for further improvements down the line. Once he captures a full year's worth of delivery history in the system, Priaulx plans to test Cube Route's automated dispatching system. "To be able to take 200 calls per day and have a system arrange them in the most economical and efficient manner would be extremely beneficial, since we can't do that ourselves," he says. "I think we'd see quite a savings if we could let a machine do it for us."
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