Trimble touts enhancements to wide range of Transportation Enterprise products

TRIMBLE’S Transportation Enterprise rolled out a wide range of new products and enhancements during the 2018 in.sight user conference + expo held September 9 to 12 at the George R Brown Convention Center in Houston, Texas.

Enhancements included updates to the TruETA solution for improved route planning. While estimated time of arrivals (ETAs) are not new to the trucking industry, the application adds a new dynamic to the solution—driver intent.

Most TMS systems allow for visibility of a route’s speed limits, traffic delays and weather factors, among other things. But, along with the enhancements to the solution, Trimble is offering two additional add-on modules for one of the most accurate ETAs—Driver Trip Planning and Out-of-Route/Out-of-Corridor.

The Driver Trip Planning module, which is a supplemental module to TruETA for TMW.Suite and TMWSuite, allow dispatchers to view how drivers are planning their trip, including rest locations they choose and durations of each stop. The tool, which runs as a module within TMWGo!, enables drivers to take into account their hours of service, and it recommends stops based on remaining drivable time. By knowing where a driver will stop, for how long they will stop, and how their hours of service are affected, the Driver Trip Planning module calculates one of the most accurate ETAs from dispatch to delivery.

“We believe the fact that we are now able to capture this information will substantially improve the quality of service that our customers will be able to provide,” said Ray West, senior vice-president and general manager of TMS solutions, Trimble Transportation Enterprise. “Every system prior to this was limited to predicting ETAs based solely off driving conditions with no input from the driver. Now, we are able to give precise ETAs with the added information of how drivers plan their trip, including how they plan around hours of service regulations.”

The added benefits of these enhancements goes beyond just increased trip planning accuracy. Because drivers can pre-plan their trips down to the location and length of stops while abiding by hours of service regulations and meeting deadlines, they can better avoid service failures, abstain from planning while driving, and maximize their hours of service, and will be more likely to retain their jobs. One of the best benefits for drivers is the ability to choose rest locations based on amenities that they are looking for. This in turn creates happier drivers and dispatchers who have an agreed upon, transparent schedule.

Another benefit of the TruETA solution is a new add-on for out-of-route and out-of-corridor for TMW.Suite, TMWSuite, and TruckMate. Out-of-route and out-of-corridor enables carriers to see when drivers take an alternate route that wasn’t part of the original plan. The carrier can see how long a trip may be extended in terms of distance, time, or both. The carrier can also alert the driver that they have diverged from the planned route and proceed back to the correct road. With out-of-route miles being so costly, along with potential late fees, this added module can help with driver route compliance and help carriers better manage margins.

Out-of-corridor alerts can also help carriers better track their high-value loads or know when a shipment of hazardous material is not on the correct road. The alert acts as a geofence that can notify dispatchers whenever the driver is a certain distance away from the intended route. This can enable the company to avoid costly fines whenever a shipment of hazardous material is on a road that it’s not supposed to be.

The TruETA solution now benefits both the back office and in-cab driver environments by allowing users to take advantage of ALK’s full suite of Trip Management services. Services include PC*MILER industry standard routing, which takes into account traffic and driver-selected, route-specific hours of service breaks, as well as ALK Maps visualization of live traffic flow and current weather conditions, including radar, cloud cover, weather alerts, road surface conditions and geofence alerting capabilities.

The Driver Trip Planning module requires TMW Go! and Systems Link v18.3 or greater to operate. Out-of-Route and Out-of-Corridor module requires TMW Suite version 2015 or greater, TMW.Suite version 2016 or greater and Systems Link version 18.3 or greater to run on the TMW Suite platform, For TruckMate users, version 18.3 or greater is required to run.

Final mile

Trimble has streamlined final mile distribution with the launch of the SmartDelivery Mobile Solution, which combines electronic proof of delivery, routing, and fleet mobility technology to help customers provide cost-effective delivery services.

With Trimble SmartDelivery, fleets can reach new levels of visibility with an end-to-end solution that:

• Reduces costs of delivery, increases delivery accuracy and provides real-time activity data

• Provides single sign-on capabilities to enable increased driver efficiency both inside and outside of the cab

• Gives drivers a more seamless driver workflow via an Electronic Proof of Delivery (ePOD) solution

“Trimble is dedicated to enhancing the final mile delivery experience for fleets, drivers and customers,” said Brian Larwig, general manager, Final Mile. “Trimble SmartDelivery enables fleets and drivers to reach new levels of connectivity and efficiency while reducing delivery costs and increasing accuracy, all through one seamless driver workflow.”

Trimble SmartDelivery utilizes single sign-on capabilities to take drivers from start to finish on their routes. Trimble SmartDelivery provides daily route planning and tracking, Hours of Service (HOS) and Electronic Logging Device (ELD) compliance, out-of-cab workflows, loading/unloading and truck assignment, deviation reporting, automatic notifications such as estimated time of arrival, and ePOD capabilities.

Trimble SmartDelivery is available on select Trimble-certified Android mobile devices. For more information, visit https://mobility.trimble.com/fleet-solutions/navigation-routing-and-final-mile-delivery to find out how fleets can implement this new functionality.

TM4Web improvements

Trimble announced the launch of a number of new features and enhancements for its TruckMate TMS solution, including ALK web services support, Trimble Mobility LTL enhancements, and better dispatching tools, among others.

Two of the more prominent enhancements are the TruckMate Chassis AR/AP Management and the TM4Web modules. The enhancement to the TruckMate Chassis AR/AP Management module will help enable Trimble customers to better track chassis, invoice for rental fees and manage payables to the chassis vendors. The upgraded TM4Web module enables quicker invoicing processes, payment acceptance, settlement and fund deposits, while helping to reduce TruckMate users’ administrative costs.

Chassis AR/AP Management

 The improved TruckMate module automates the chassis management process. This tool will aid users in managing chassis contracts, auto rate customer invoices and upload invoices provided by chassis provider. Additionally, TruckMate’s reconciliation tools help to spot discrepancies showing a side-by-side comparison of chassis pool bills against the outstanding customer bills.

The competitive advantage of this module is that users can manage chassis provider contracts, accounts receivable, dispute resolution and accounts payable all in one system. This will help reduce the time employees spend using multiple systems to plan trips, bill customers and dispute charges.

“The enhanced chassis management tool is great for businesses that use intermodal shipping,” said Harald Fritz, vice president of TruckMate, Trimble Transportation Enterprise. “TruckMate users will be able to bill their customers quicker while paying their chassis providers in a more timely fashion. With this more efficient chassis management module, it’s a win-win for all parties involved.”

TM4Web

With the enhanced TruckMate TM4Web module, users get an advanced set of customizable online tools that will help empower their customers to better manage their invoices. The online, web-based payment solution reduces costs by giving Trimble users’ customers the ability to manage their outstanding invoices. It also decreases the amount of time staff spends on the phone or processing bills from the mail, which allows them more time to work on priority customers.

TM4Web online payment module makes it easy for customers of Trimble users to view outstanding invoices and make a payment online. Payments may be made using a credit card through a third party PCI compliant payment gateway.

“We’ve enhanced TM4Web to the point where it’s almost a completely new solution,” Fritz said. “It’s incredible how much more efficient we believe our customers’ staffs will become because they are not spending so much time on invoicing and tracking payments. Instead, the system enables quicker processes for invoicing, payment acceptance, settlement and fund deposits, which will help reduce administrative costs and boost customer satisfaction.”

Enhancements were made to Trimble’s Risk Management, Extended Pay and RouteSync modules that operate within the Innovative IES Transportation Management System (TMS) solution. Trimble’s Innovative IES is designed to operate on an IBM system as a full accounting and dispatching solution for trucking companies.

IES Risk Management

The Innovative IES Risk Management tool offers customers the ability to manage their accidents, incidents, cargo claims and workers comp issues from within the Innovative IES product. The redesigned claims management screen makes it easier than ever to find key information within one mouse click, which makes sorting, positioning and filtering search criteria easier and enables users quicker access to find open claims and information. This allows customers more time to work on their claims rather than searching for information.

An additional benefit of the enhancements is better visibility into current risk exposure, which can help customers manage future costs from accidents, incidents, workers comp and cargo claims. Users can now more efficiently view important statistics that insurance companies might ask for, such as the number of accidents per year or number of incidents in a certain state.

“The new dashboard really simplifies how our customers use the module,” said Sejal Kadakia, vice-president of IBM i, Trimble Transportation Enterprise. “But, perhaps the best new feature is the ability to track driver performance. Our customers can understand things like how many accidents a driver has been in or the number of cargo claims that were filed for a certain driver. This will really help our customers improve their ability to reward drivers for good behaviors.”

Extended Pay

While the Trimble Innovative IES solution already had payment options, the Extended Pay module added new features designed to increase efficiencies and expand customers’ payment options. The all new functions include: paying drivers a rate per mile that is dependent on weekly miles driven; performing a one-time quick payment for an owner or driver without going through the trial/final payroll/settlements steps; and, enabling the ability to import drivers work hours and pay an hourly rate based on months of service.

These new functions help enhance the relationship between drivers and owners with the ability to quickly make a one-time payment, which can help boost driver retention by adding additional methods to calculate pay. With the quick payment option, the payroll department can save time when making a one-time payment is required. And, with payment features based on weekly mileage or hourly pay, the calculations are automated after a one-time setup.

RouteSync

RouteSync is a new module that operates within the Innovative IES solution and integrates with ExpertFuel, MobileComm and ALK PC*MILER to provide turn-by-turn directions to drivers based on mileage trip options and routing preferences. It includes all defined stops for a load along with fuel solutions.

RouteSync is designed to help ensure stricter route compliance and in-vehicle consistency. It provides the crucial link between the planned route in the back office and the navigated route in the vehicle. This link will help Trimble customers save money on fuel costs by adhering to optimized routes, increase on-time arrivals, limit liability by strict routing for hazmat loads, respond to out-of-route conditions quicker with increased visibility and improved ETAs.

Improved invoicing

The new TMW Mobile Imaging and TMW.Suite Cloud Imaging products were launched in in.sight. The two products were created with an integration to TMW Suite, which helps relieve manual document collection and management processes.

TMW Mobile Imaging is designed to alleviate disruptions to freight settlement. This product is ideal for carriers who have a large number of images that are incorrectly matched to loads. The integrated system matches captured images to the correct load based on required data in the Transportation Management System (TMS), which enhances accuracy. An additional benefit is that it pairs with TMW.Suite Cloud Imaging to help simplify the classification process once a document has been sent from TMW Mobile Imaging. This can transform the laborious process of indexing documents and allows processing to be done immediately.

TMW.Suite Cloud Imaging is an easy-to-adopt imaging solution for document retrieval, indexing, and rendition invoice printing. Because the product is solely cloud based, it can scale to fit the needs of customers as their business needs continue to grow. The solution enables drivers to upload images to the cloud directly from their phones through TMW Go!, TruckMate Dash or Innovative In-motion mobile apps.

“The integration of these two new solutions will simplify the work for both dispatchers and drivers,” said Trimble Transportation Enterprise’s West. “By using both products side-by-side, drivers can use Mobile Imaging to focus more on completing deliveries safely and less about the billing, while the dispatchers can access the information from anywhere because it’s completely SaaS based.”

Key features of the TMW Mobile Imaging solution include:

• Improves the accuracy of matching paperwork to the loads; manual paperwork matching tends to lead to a high number of mismatches.

• Reduces days sales outstanding by easily capturing all images at the moment of discovery and auto indexes, enabling immediate processing and faster payment.

• Reduces billing errors and disputes by tracking documents all the way through the TMS, so processing is efficient and simple.

• Improves driver satisfaction by enabling drivers to focus more on safely delivering freight on time and less on the paperwork.

Key features of the TMW.Suite Cloud Imaging solution include:

• Simple adoption as a fully SaaS based solution and easy to add to a TMW platform.

• Boosts customer satisfaction because users can leverage the rendition printing feature by automatically including the required documents for the billing purposes.

Over-air updates

Trimble’s CoPilot Truck in-cab navigation app for Android can now be updated over the air via Wi-Fi. For customers using the CoPilot Truck app on Android, they can now distribute important map updates across their entire driver base, eliminating the need to manually update the data one device or truck at a time.

“Providing drivers with the latest navigation data is crucial to ensure on-time deliveries, reduce out of route miles and improve fuel economy across an entire fleet,” said Bryan Coyne, general manager of Trimble Transportation Mobility. “With the simple push of a button, fleets with CoPilot Truck for Android can implement these updates remotely, quickly giving drivers accurate information and freeing up maintenance teams to focus on other, more pressing issues.”

The CoPilot Truck app provides smart route planning and offline navigation, enabling fleets to boost route compliance and measure driver performance, enhance customer service and on-time deliveries, and maximize revenue and the bottom line with reduced fuel and operating costs.

New features also available with this version of CoPilot Truck include Driver Map Feedback, which allows drivers to mark a problem location to enable map improvements. The new version also includes the Road Warnings feature, which is powered by DriverIntel and gives drivers early warnings of upcoming rollover risk hazards when the driver is navigating through a high-risk area.

For more information about the CoPilot Truck app, visit http://copilottruck.com/en-us. Visit https://mobility.trimble.com/fleet-solutions/navigation-routing-and-final-mile-delivery for more information about Trimble’s in-cab navigation capabilities.