Central Freight Lines, a nationwide less-than-truckload (LTL) carrier, is utilizing an SaaS transportation logistics solution from Cheetah Software Services Inc. to remain competitive in a recessionary marketplace. In implementing the Cheetah Freight solution, Central Freight made the decision to focus on improving the visibility of drivers and deliveries, while increasing the timeliness and effectiveness of communications between drivers, dispatchers, customer service reps and customers.
The carrier was able to not only improve driver productivity and reduce miles per stop, but also to consolidate and centralize dispatch and customer service and thus strengthen its overall position.
“After only six months or so, Cheetah has already helped us accomplish the 3-5% increase in productivity and the 5-10% reduction in miles per stop that we hoped to achieve with the solution,” says Mark Stein, Central Freight’s director of operations. “Even more important, we’ve been able to remotely dispatch multiple locations from a single location. We’ve been able to consolidate management teams and more efficiently manage the business. And, we’ve been able to provide better customer service by centralizing our customer service function.”
Specifically, Cheetah Freight provides Central Freight’s dispatchers with three primary capabilities. First, the solution provides real-time pickup and delivery status information that was previously unavailable. Second, dispatchers can now make decisions more efficiently, on the fly, regarding the best drivers to service on-demand pickups. And third, Central Freight can gather information on pickup and delivery status and integrate it into their backend systems for immediate processing, rather than waiting until the end of the day.
In addition, Central Freight customers now receive instant access to more information on delivery and pickup status, knowing not only where a shipment has been but also where it is going, when it will arrive, and when the recipient has signed for it, in real time.
