Technology to the Rescue

It's not just UPS and FedEx that are bringing cutting-edge technology to the LTL sector.

By John D. Schulz, Contributing Editor -- Logistics Management, 6/13/2007 12:05:00 PM

It’s not just UPS and FedEx that are bringing cutting-edge technology to the LTL sector. Several regional LTL carriers have spent millions of dollars to provide LTL shippers with basically the same type of tracking-and-tracing capabilities that have long existed in the small-package sector.

FedEx Freight drivers now carry hand-held devices to track all their LTL shipments for customers. Old Dominion Freight Line is implementing a similar system and, in a safety-related matter, is outfitting 1,200 of its trucks with automatic lane-departure warning systems for its drivers.

But it is the tracking-and-tracing capability that shippers are most requesting from their LTL partners. “We formed a business-to-business advisory board with 10 customers to gain insight into what they wanted from us, and real-time tracking-and-tracing was the No. 1 item,” says Scott Sullivan, vice president of information technology and services for Pittsburgh-based Pitt Ohio Express.

That doesn’t surprise trucking analyst John Larkin of Stifel, Nicolaus in Baltimore.

“You basically know where every shipment is all the time,” he says. “The bigger boys are all moving in that direction. That’s a bigger competitive gap for the smaller people to close. It’s much more difficult for the smaller guys to offer that type of device.”

At Pitt Ohio, the decision was made to eschew hand-held computers in favor of onboard, in-dash computers for its roughly 1,200 trucks. What that has allowed the eleven-state regional LTL carrier to perform is nothing short of “real-time” tracking, Sullivan says. “Basically what we’ve done is electronically automate our entire dispatch and pickup-and-delivery functions,” he says.

Here’s how it works: A shipper sends a pick-up order to Pitt Ohio either through electronic data interchange, telephone, or computer. A Pitt Ohio central computer in downtown Pittsburgh automatically dispatches it to the right driver. There is no other communication. It will also alert the driver that there is a pickup to be made. The driver hits a button on his console and sees that the pickup details, including number of pieces and skids to be loaded.

“It enables us to do better outbound projections of our freight loads,” says Sullivan. “As the driver performs the delivery the next day, everything is electronically submitted. It’s updated when the driver arrives and leaves the destination. There is an automatic status update and within minutes we display status on our website. Customers can see when their freight was delivered in real time.”

There’s more. The customer can build a B2B link in their website to check on status and build an image retrieval function in order to take delivery receipts online. Pitt Ohio has formed partnerships with “near-air freight” truckload carrier Landair and Kingsway, an LTL carrier in Canada. When their freight goes on either of those carriers, the technology transfers as well. What’s next? Sullivan says customers are asking for proactive notification of any exceptions or problems in their deliveries. He says Pitt Ohio is working to roll out those innovations shortly.

When asked whether FedEx or UPS’s recent entry into the LTL market caused Pitt Ohio to step up its commitment to technology, Sullivan didn’t flinch. At Pitt Ohio our mission in the LTL world is to beat them to the punch,” he said. “We don’t look at it as a problem. We look at it as a challenge.”