10 Nov End-to-End cargo tracking – utmost essential tech module to transform air cargo operations
Cargo tracking is finding a lot more relevance than it did in recent years. Air cargo operations are rapid in nature, but it comes with a higher cost and a large amount of secured processes within the airport environment. Due to these secured functions, it is often a challenging task for freight forwarders, transporters and others to know the milestone updates within the air cargo environment in case the cargo gets stranded within.
Reportedly, lack of end-to-end updates is leading to loss of cargo and this is quite prevalent in regions such as North America and Europe. Well, this loss of cargo reflects on the revenue of stakeholders such as freight forwarders and transporters.
Can a cargo community system be leveraged?
Well, the cargo community system is a new-age tool that encourages communication among stakeholders on the land side and air side. Yes, a community system empowers all stakeholders to interact with each other to curtail the complexities involved in manual and legacy systems. Just by eliminating the communication bottleneck, a significant amount of complexities can be reduced and some of them are as follows
Cost reduction & no revenue leakage
Freight forwarders and transporters along with ground handlers, customs brokers and others always find it challenging to eliminate bottlenecks. These bottlenecks are often due to data redundancies and a lack of communication among stakeholders. But with a cargo community system that comes with a cargo tracking module, often the need for paper-based documentation is eliminated. By eliminating them, document exchange is done through EDI. Therefore, redundant data entries as well as paper-based documents are voided in one go. In turn, this leads to a reduction of the cost incurred with zero revenue leakage.
Increased security
Loss of cargo is a challenge for the stakeholders on the land side as well as the air side. But, with an end-to-end cargo tracking module that shares real-time status updates in a common portal to all stakeholders, the emphasis on security is even higher. Moreover, abandoned cargo is quickly given attention by the stakeholder in close proximity. Therefore, security is a default perspective for a cargo tracking application.
Realtime visibility with milestone updates
Every stakeholder on the air side and land side, complains about lack of visibility. Once the cargo enters the airport environment, there is no update on what happens next, according to a transporter. Yet, this can be sorted if all stakeholders are connected through a common portal and they exchange documents such as Air Waybill (AWB), Manifest etc, which will be visible to all. This transparent approach gives no room for error as well as no scope for cargo loss/theft.
Precisely, a cargo community system enriched with a cargo tracking module can offer end-to-end visibility of freight movement within and outside the airport cargo environment. A service provider with a multi-modal capability will offer more value as they can facilitate trans-shipment functions too.