Whether you store your retail or wholesale inventory in your own warehouses, or you are a third-party logistics company responsible for fulfilment and distribution of external clients’ products, you depend on one or multiple carriers to deliver your goods.

However, reaching a streamlined business process from order entry through delivery is becoming more challenging. Businesses need to contend with ever changing rules, regulations and rates from major carriers.

Furthermore, customers have grown to expect increasingly shorter delivery windows and lower costs. According to a study from Temando, 80% of shoppers expect same-day shipping, yet only 53% of retailers ship same-day. If your current supply chain management solution does not offer direct integration with the carriers you use, your optimal dispatch capability will just not cut it, especially at peak times…

So how are you going to close the gap between what you’re able to deliver and what your customer expects? Now is the time to evaluate your operations and embrace an automated approach to order fulfilment. Shoppers will determine the success of your business by voting with their wallets, and you need to provide an experience that will turn them into loyal, long-term customers.

An automated Warehouse Management System (WMS) can streamline your fulfilment, manifesting and shipping processes, by seamlessly integrating with your transportation partners.

We have enlisted the 5 top benefits of having an integrated Application Programming Interface (API) with carriers:

1- Lower Costs

By automating your shipping processes, carrier integration eliminates the need for manual data entry into each individual carrier website. That saves a significant amount of labour time, allowing your business to redirect these workers to other stages of the fulfilment process.

Additionally, the WMS’s shipping management functionality ensures orders are not only carrier compliant but also shipped at the lowest possible cost. Thus, it will enable your business to cut down on shipping costs while increasing the reliability of shipments.

2- Increase Accuracy

By removing manual data entry, the human error factor is significantly reduced. The result is greater accuracy for all consignments. Moreover, reducing data entry errors saves wasted time, effort and costs associated with delayed deliveries and returns.

3- Increase Efficiency

Customers these days have very high expectations. They want short delivery times and precise delivery windows. Meeting these expectations often entails using multiple carriers and juggling these different carriers and their systems is not an easy business. Automating the process produces a streamlined, more efficient method of connecting fulfilment and shipping.

4- Improve customer service

Customer complaints due to missing deliveries, incorrect shipping details or inaccurate tracking harm the reputation of your business. But when delivery details are accurate and tracking information is provided, then customers receive their orders and enjoy a positive retail experience.

A fully Carrier Integrated WMS will allow you real-time visibility into the status and location of your deliveries. This information is invaluable for your customers! By providing them with this visibility and meeting their delivery expectations, you’re sure to earn their trust and loyalty.

5- Cost-Saving

An operation that saves time, improves efficiency, delivers accuracy and has satisfied customers is one that is minimising costs and maximising profits.

Full WMS X Carrier Integration

Whether you are shopping the cheapest parcel rate, fastest delivery service, or comparing LTL rates, a Warehouse Management System (WMS) is an essential tool to help you gain control of your shipping operations.

HighJump’s ‘Ship’ provides real-time access to current shipment status while storing a complete archive of shipping documentation. Combined with Actionable Analytics that provide real-time dashboards with relevant shipping related KPIs, users can drill into critical application data to identify problems before they happen.

Additionally, the WMS enables efficient vendor compliance by printing on-demand, customer-specific ship labels, pack slips, manifests, and bill of ladings (BOLs).

iWMS Australasia

iWMS Australasia utilizes HighJump technology, a solution that can be scaled and tailored to meet any business needs. Our developers have successfully developed, tested and implemented carrier integration for various major carriers such as AUSPost, StarTrack and Cainiao.

Click here to learn more about HighJump Ship.