Company Description
A large manufacturer of paper products with several manufacturing facilities and multiple distribution centers across North America
Summary
Manual shipping processes that relied on direct communication with multiple distribution centers were causing shipping delays for this manufacturer of paper products. A new acquisition compounded this problem as they were expecting a 400% increase in order volume. Using vShip, from vSync, this company was able to automate communications with their distribution centers, and streamline the entire shipping process improving the number of shipments the company could process daily. The improvements they received enabled them to increase cash flow while improving customer service.
Key EDI & Shipping Issues
For a manufacturer that prides themselves on same day shipping, manual processing of orders was taking a toll on operations. With 5 distribution centers each fulfilling roughly 80 shipments each day warehouse staff found themselves logging miles between their printer, their shipping stations and the fax machine.
During peak season each warehouse could process nearly 140 orders per day and with a recent acquisition of a new company, this paper products manufacturer found themselves in a situation that would increase order volume by 400%. The company had 60 days to figure out a solution that would be cost effective, scalable, and provide better automation to easily accommodate their current and future growth.
As orders were received at headquarters, pick tickets were sent to be printed at one of 5 distribution centers across the country. On average each shipment contained between 8-16 line items shipped in 4-5 containers. Warehouse staff manually noted any updates or changes on the picking ticket as the packing of each order was completed.
The entire shipment was then taken to a shipping station where warehouse staff would estimate which carrier provided the best possible shipping rate based on either a hunch, or based on which carrier system they preferred. The company utilized a combination of shipping systems from FedEx and UPS as well as a less-than-truckload carrier for oversized shipments.
Once labels were printed, employees would hand record additional shipment information on the pick ticket which would then be placed in an "out box" to be faxed back to corporate for additional processing.
Advance Ship Notices were required for a good portion of this company's customer base. Several employees at headquarters were tasked with interpreting handwritten notes on the 400 completed, faxed, pick tickets each morning to create and send Advance Ship Notices.
In addition, quantities fulfilled, shipping information and freight charges needed to be added to the sales order in Microsoft Dynamics GP prior to invoicing each customer.
Problem Resolution & Results
The company chose vShip integrated shipping for Microsoft Dynamics GP to help them streamline the process and accelerate the amount of shipments each warehouse could process daily.
Using vShip, the company was easily able to accommodate the acquisition of another company and fold shipment processing into their new established processes.
vShip is licensed by location and not by user which provided a cost effective means for multiple employees in each warehouse to utilize as many workstations as needed.
Built specifically for Microsoft Dynamics GP, sales orders were electronically sent to the appropriate warehouse based on a pre-configured setup in Microsoft Dynamics GP either by Location ID or in some cases by product. Today employees still pick up pick tickets, however vShip records and tracks all fulfillment and shipment data for them eliminating hand written notes using order details pulled in from the actual sales order.
The vShip system then completes the shipping manifest and labels required for either UPS, FedEx or their LTL carrier. Once the shipment is completed all fulfillment quantities and shipping data are automatically written back to the Microsoft Dynamics sales order eliminating the hundreds of faxes and data entry previously required for each order.
vShip also writes back freight charges to Microsoft Dynamics GP so invoices can accurately capture shipping expenses. Additionally, because vShip captures all item and container details for each order, the Advance Ship Notice is automatically generated and sent to the customer resulting in no additional data entry and on-time arrival of ASNs, which greatly reduced charge-back fees.
Deploying vShip enabled warehouse employees to fulfill orders faster and with greater accuracy, which enabled the warehouses to fulfill more orders when the newly acquired company was brought on. The elimination of additional data entry to record fulfilled quantities, back orders, freight charges and shipping details meant sales orders could be turned into invoices in half the time.
The company found that by sending invoices faster, their order-to-cash cycle was reduced by nearly two weeks greatly enhancing payment cycles and cash flow.