Call Center Scheduling Featured Article
Transportation Scheduling Necessary to Improve Manufacturing Operations
With increasing competition and challenging economic conditions, companies are forced to turn to technologies that help improve productivity like Appointment scheduling, call center scheduling and workforce management solutions are among some of these technologies that help improve productivity in businesses.
Workforce scheduling is gaining relevance not only in call centers and retail industry, but also among manufacturing, small businesses segment, transportation industries and professionals.
Appointment-Plus is one company that offers appointment scheduling software to almost all industry verticals. According to the company, managing deliveries with transportation scheduling software is quickly becoming a necessity for manufacturers.
This finding is based on the fact that nationwide productivity continues to rise in the manufacturing segment. According to the recent forecast from the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation, industrial production will increase 2.2 percent in 2013, an increase from the 2 percent reported in its 2012 forecast. It expects the growth rate to increase to 3.6 percent in 2014.
Appointment-Plus provides Software-as-a-Service (SaaS (News - Alert)) technology to help manage inbound shipments. With this software, any manufacturer can save two hours or more in staff time daily.
Once the service is implemented, there is no need for a dispatcher or dock staff to schedule a delivery time over the phone or fax. Instead, a carrier can schedule delivery times from any Internet-connected device, including a laptop, smartphone or tablet.
Based on the case studies with different customers, AppointmentPlus says that the software can reduce dock detention fees by 75 percent. It can also reduce or eliminate overtime salary expenses by scheduling dock staff hours around specific booked deliveries.
Additionally, the software can automatically send e-mail and text message reminders prior to scheduled delivery times. This reduces late or missed deliveries. Since the cloud-based service is accessible from anywhere, including smartphones and tablets, employees get instant access to delivery schedules and carrier information.
Finally, the appointment scheduling software allows the delivery data to be maintained within the system. It also has the ability to quickly run and create reports. Some of these online scheduling systems also provide analytics functionality, which creates easy-to-read summaries of delivery details.
Edited by Ashley Caputo