Trucking Industry: Why Paper-Based Becomes Outdated?
Summary
The transportation industry is moving away from paper-based processes to digital processes to increase efficiency, reduce costs, and improve sustainability. Paper-based processes are outdated due to their limited storage space, high probability of damage, security concerns, limited collaboration among departments, and negative environmental impact. Digitizing logistics and transportation operations through software for document management, automating manual processes, and transforming the company through digital processes can help with trip summary reports, ePODs, invoices and BOLs, inspection reports, load weight confirmation sheets, vehicle information, and maintenance schedules and reports. Benefits of digitizing include increased efficiency, cost savings, improved collaboration, better decision-making, increased security, and improved environmental sustainability.
In the 1690s, the foundation was set to manufacture paper. From the rise of paper, much knowledge was documented in the way of books, newspapers, ideas and led to even more advancements. In addition, many businesses relied on paper for documentation, invoices, and various forms to record the data.
In the era of electronic data, 75% of manufactures document their work-related data manually. While manually administering quality and safety programs on paper may appear less expensive, it is inefficient and leaves a lot of chances for errors.
For business development to cross the next level each time, it is necessary to keep the old records and past events that happened from the beginning. Old data helps to develop the ability to analyze any situation as it broadens the decision-making perspective. It provides information like strategies followed during a particular period and global economic evolution that helps to plot the new set of standards to improve performance.
There are certain drawbacks to safely keeping your company’s important information and records. Let’s see the factors of how your data will be inaccessible over time and unsafe to maintain the information.
In the transportation sector, we have heard of trip expenses, fuel expenses, and maintenance expenses. However, are you aware of how much expenses are involved in documentation in the backend of the logistics administration process?
1.Limited Storage Space
Day by day, when the data is recorded in paper-based files, then it can take up a lot of space. When the volume of information grows, the number of paper documents will rise, and the documents should be kept handy so that they can be accessed as fast as possible. However, this results in mismanagement and slows down the process of accessing a target file.
2.High Probability for Damage
If you use paper-based documents and the files are destroyed or deleted, you will suffer from losing all your company information without any backup. Imagine incidents like theft, misplacement, unnatural disasters like fire, or any natural calamity that could result in the loss of important data.
3.Security Concerns
Paper documents that consist of important information or valuable data are considered more prone to security threats for businesses. This is because they can be mistreated, readily lost, and damaged by unprofessional employees or could be damaged easily if not handled carefully.
4.Limited Collaboration among Departments
Suppose a piece of information needs to be shared among different departments inside an organization. In that case, they need to print multiple copies, and before moving to the final version of the document, they will make changes separately with their versions. This seems to be like hovering for small work for a long time.
In addition, it requires extra printers, photocopiers, tonnes of paper and other office supplies. This becomes a considerable expense for many businesses.
5. Impacts on Environment
Many companies started to follow green credentials, particularly logistics sectors aimed to reduce environmental impacts and promote sustainability to gain long-term benefits.
Based on Global Forest Resource Assessment, around 80,000 to 160,000 trees are cut down every day around the world, in that a large portion of them is used in the paper manufacturing industry.
So, many organizations have environmentally friendly options to reduce paperwork to follow sustainability practices. Irrespective of the firm’s size and operations, the logistics industry drives it to move away from paper-based operations to entirely paperless processes.
Technological innovations played a significant role throughout the history of the Industrial Revolution. For the past few years, the logistics industry has been migrating into the digital realm.
Fast forward to the 20th century, and all organizations were keen to adopt new technology to make their work documented for their purpose to simplify their paper-based works and bring better products to market faster than their competitors.
Let’s discuss the important aspects of logistics transportation operations are. Always follow the points mentioned below to ease your operations,
- Software for Document Management
- Automate Manual Processes by Digitizing Your Documents
- Transform your company through Digital Processes
What are the important Data entry procedures for a fleet sector?
- Trip Summary and Reports
- Bill Of Lading
- Fuel Expense Reports
- Proof of Delivery
- Inspection Reports
- Maintenance Schedules and Reports
- Invoices
- Load Weight Confirmation Sheet
- Expense Reports
- Vehicle Information
Based on the fleet size and operations, for how long will you be entering the details manually for ten different reports?
With VAMOSYS FleetOS and DRS Driver App, document management becomes easy. Organize and save your documents digitally by eliminating paper files.
1.Trip Summary Reports
Plan end-to-end trip planning and generate digital reports for every trip without hassle, irrespective of the fleet size.
2.ePOD's, eBills, Invoices, and BOL
Scan and send the documents on the spot without any delay for approvals and generating invoices to fasten your operations. You can access the bills and documents for reference at any time.
3. Inspection Reports
Pre Checklist and Postchecklist can be done through the DRS app by the driver and can share the checklist with the fleet managers to review the vehicle condition before and after the trip.
4. Load Weight Confirmation Sheet
When you create an invoice or a rapid dispatch, the Load Rate Confirmation sheet is immediately generated based on the information you submit.
5. Vehicle Information
As a fleet owner, save the list of vehicles you have in the FleetOS app with Registration number, vehicle type, and License number and assign the driver based on the requirement.
6.Maintenance Schedules and Reports
Set reminders to schedule periodical maintenance to avoid vehicle breakdowns and save the reports to see the history of repair works for every vehicle.
7.Expense Reports
Make expense calculation easy by updating refueling charges, vehicle breakdown charges, and other expenses in the app with documented proof so that you do not need to spend huge hours calculating manually.
Sushanthi
Sushanthi is a Content Writer who wishes to be the voice of brands to project their innovative ideas and stories through her writing skills.