With the meteoric rise of premium rates and container shortages across ocean freight, innovative capabilities for business development such as AI and process automation are becoming increasingly important for freight forwarders to stay afloat amidst all disruptions.

The problems we’re facing in the industry aren’t new, but revealed just how vulnerable and complacent our old systems were to any major problem. Even before COVID-19, supply chains had become increasingly complex and struggled to meet high demands for goods. As the entire world was becoming rapidly driven by e-commerce and digital interface, a lot of traditional forwarders were only beginning to transition out of their legacy system.

However, investing in new capabilities is quite daunting, with the average 3PL being at least 10-15 years behind in their technology even before 2021. This ultimately makes finding the right solution for your needs more essential than ever.

Rose Containerline’s Vice President Lance Beresnoy, has been at the forefront of spearheading digital transformation for his entire organization. As a business that began operating in 1994, Rose was both a traditional forwarder and a digital-oriented team. He said that the pandemic has forced a change in business practices for many companies in the sector and those that have embraced technology and a new digital strategy would always do better.

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He shares that “The start of the pandemic was very challenging. We were all required to work remotely and we were forced to embrace as much technology as possible, in every aspect of what we do. Working with Expedock over the past year has really helped catapult us because it enabled our operators to handle a lot more business and in particular focus on customer service.”

As much as we hate to say it, automation is not a cure-all to all your problems. You'll need to figure out the exact blockers that’s negatively affecting your business. That way, you can effectively implement a solution that works for you. When done correctly, this unlocks unprecedented growth and customer satisfaction in the long term.

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For example, Rose Containerline had difficulty extracting thousands of drayage invoices, checking them, and then entering that data into their logistics management system. Aside from the difficulty in processing invoices at scale, Rose Containerline’s transport partners would not enter accrual information for the shipment; would enter everything as a lump sum instead of breaking down line items; or enter the wrong charge code. This would inevitably lead to additional costs being incurred. This became even more pressing as they began to work on a limited staff and budget remotely.

Critically, Expedock has removed the need for Rose employees to spend time on manual data entry, freeing them up to focus more on customers. Results from just a couple of months of automating workflows have shortened the cash cycle from weeks to a couple days. Alongside this, it also increased their overall accrual compliance by over 50%.

“Automation wasn’t something I was previously aware of or very keen on and I was skeptical until I saw it in action”, Lance added. “The pricing and structure of Expedock really suited us and we hit it off right from the start. For us, relationships are key and that was the biggest reason for us moving forward. Other providers lock you into monthly or annual fees, which ignores the fluctuations of seasonal volumes. We pay for what we use and that approach really worked for us. “We’re on track to stop losses of more than half a million dollars as a result of Expedock’s AI Service,” he added.

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“Expedock is essentially enabling us to have more staff and handle more work. It is saving my staff at least a day’s worth of work each week. Not having to do the data entry, whether it’s on the arrival notice side or the FCL (Full Container Load) booking side, it’s a tremendous time saver. That means they can go out and get more business or service our clients better. In this industry time is money, especially in this post-pandemic world.”‍

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Expedock CEO and co-founder King Alandy Dy said: “Rose Containerline is a great example of a freight forwarder that recognized the potential cost savings of a strong digital strategy. The Rose team needed to find ways of creating new cost efficiencies and achieve more with the same resources. Together with their leadership team, Expedock was able to play a key role in helping them improve their cashflow by 3-5 days with entry & reconciliation automation. Together we streamlined their documentation and ultimately cut their costs and saved them money.”

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About Expedock

Expedock is a company founded by Stanford AI researchers that raised at $20M to automate extraction and reconciliation from all freight documents like APs, CIs, BoLs and more. Our end-to-end solution provides 100% Cargowise Certified-level accuracy and financially guarantees it. Our existing customers include CEVA Logistics and Roadrunner Freight (Ascent Global Logistics). We’ve also been featured as a leading provider by JOC.

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About Rose Containerline

Established over 27 years ago, Rose Containerline is a full service NVOCC and logistics provider. We offer ocean, air, and trucking services tailored to meet the needs of each individual client. Headquartered in New York, Rose maintains a national trucking and warehousing network with regional hubs in Atlanta, Chicago and Los Angeles. Attentive customer service and 24/7 online pricing tools simplify the process, making Rose and its clients more competitive. Rose is fully licensed by the FMC and accredited by TSA, IATA. We are represented by professional forwarders on five continents and able to ship anytime, anywhere.

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