Sharper Imaging

Few industries are as inundated by paper as trucking. Carriers generate paper records that not only need to be retained, but retrieved and shared with others, both inside and outside the company. So it was welcome news, a few years ago, when technology writers (myself included, I have to confess) were touting the arrival of the “paperless office.”

The theory was that advances in automation would mean more information would be stored in digital format. You could wheel your filing cabinets to the curb.

In fact, the opposite happened. The growing use of computers in business has generated more paper, not less. It’s hard enough to physically store it all, let alone quickly find an edgy shipper’s P.O.D.

“We always need to trace everything back to the beginning,” says Franca Carbonara, compliance co-ordinator at XTL Transport in Etobicoke, Ont. “That means everything from trip sheets to logs, pre-trip and post-trip inspection forms, driving permits to customs forms. It’s an awful lot of paper.”

Part of Carbonara’s job is overseeing logbook audits for the company’s drivers. She has software to help her analyze trip data, but manually entering odometer readings and duty status information into the system just isn’t efficient when you’re generating 400 logs a day. So XTL uses a scanner and Microsoft Windows-based software (from Moncton-based Trip Data and Safety Management) to take a digital picture of each log and import the raw information into a database, so each record is easy to locate, analyze, share, and transfer. The digital records are stored on optical disks; the paper logs are stored for six months and then discarded.

XTL has its own software and hardware for high-volume document imaging, which can be expensive. Basic requirements are a scanner, an image viewing system (often bundled with document imaging software), and the software and hardware required to compress and display images. And don’t forget about extra data-storage capacity. Each scanned text image takes up about 16 Kb of storage-about 1 Mb for 30 pages.

While prices for imaging systems have fallen since the technology was introduced in the mid 1980s, Gartner Group, a research firm, pegs the average cost of equipment, storage, and computing power capable of high-volume imaging at $50,000 US. Furthermore, you should plan to invest more as imaging technology evolves; for example, storage tools used today (optical disks) soon may be obsolete, according to Gartner.
And what started out as a client/server model is now changing
to a Web-based technology.

Outsourcing

One option is to have someone else handle your imaging. Companies like Pegasus TransFlo and TMI, which operates the TripPak Express and TripPak Online imaging services, specialize in scanning and archiving documents for the trucking industry. Both allow you to view and manage your archived documents via the Internet, using an ordinary browser.

Typically, the records are available a day after they’re scanned: that kind of fast, easy access to trip documents can speed up the billing cycle and driver settlements compared to using terminal drops. And if a driver or customer calls in and needs a bill of lading or proof of delivery, you can pull up the images of the documents and e-mail, fax, or print a hard copy right away.

So while we’re still far away from a “paperless” office, technology can, if chosen well and used appropriately, create more efficient workflows that are a real competitive advantage.