Solutions for Shipping, Tracking, And Freight Management
At JM Rodgers, all of our customers receive special treatment with an assortment of IT solutions that range from basic spreadsheet reports to complex web tracking applications.
We build solutions with our customers in mind. We have built websites for some of our clients that reflect their needs and it has proven to be a difference in our service. Customization can be as simple as providing tracking information on containers to a complete brokerage/freight management package that will give a JM Rodgers client access to our brokerage side of the business as well as our freight management operations.
Our own web development team gives clients access to the data that we produce on our Brokerage/Drawback Information System in a neat and concise design. Our web development products give access to a whole array of information that includes the following:
Shipment Details:
This interface provides very basic information about the shipment such as Voyage/Flight Number, Supplier, Customs Status, Port of Lading, etc.
Shipment Dates:
This interface provides date tracing on the events that can take place with any of our client’s shipments. Date tracing can be done on Customs Entry submission, last bill date, shipment arrival, Customs clearance, etc.
Container Information:
For ocean shipments, our clients are able to see all containers that are part of a particular shipment and see their size, weight, number of cartons, etc.
Duties and Fees Paid:
This interface provides all information on all the duties paid, fees and bond information.
Delivery Order Information:
This interface provides the basic information that our clients would see in any Delivery Order that we produce.
Imaging:
This interface provides visual access to all documents that are produced on our Brokerage/Drawback Information System as well as any other external documents such as commercial invoices, packing lists and bill of ladings.
Each of the preceding interfaces can be modified to depict a wide collection of information that is stored on our Brokerage/Drawback Information System. The information can also be retrieved via a web download or in the same manner that we provide the Excel spreadsheet that many clients are used to seeing in their mailboxes. We can customize many reports on the fly from our own Brokerage/Drawback Information Systems. Our clients can simply tell us the information that they want and the frequency of a report delivery, and they will receive it via e-mail or FTP.
We, at JM Rodgers Company, are very inclined to think that the best service we can offer is the ability to provide our clients with products that are tailored to their needs. Any Customs/Drawback broker/freight manager can provide Internet Tracking capabilities based on the canned packages that they buy from their software vendors. Although we have the same technologies that they use, we go a step further and develop technologies of our own.
The main reason we started developing websites for our clients is to satisfy the shortcomings of our own canned package (Internet Tracking). We have the capability of extracting data from our Brokerage/Drawback Information System and deliver it to our clients into a website without being restricted by our own vendor’s software. We supplied daily spreadsheets to some of our clients, but for certain special clients, we build a website that fits their needs.
We use the latest web technologies for securing our client’s website: all web content will be delivered under Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology from the moment our clients log on until the time they log off. We make sure that we take ALL necessary steps to provide the absolute best security technologies into the development of a website. Furthermore, we are open to adhere to any standards given by any of our clients by using Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to connect their networks to ours and keep all delivery of their content behind firewalls.
How Do We Achieve This Level of Customization?
We simply listen to our clients’ needs. During our visits to setup a new client and throughout the course of business, we are always trying to solve our clients’ needs by building procedures that are meant to eliminate waste and provide value to the business relationship.
We visit our client’s office and discuss our ideas along with their own concerns and establish a common ground on the application development. On our visits, we want to get a feeling on what our client expects or what kind of features they currently work with. We build internal controls that would send notifications via e-mail when any event takes place. By the same token we can build controls designed to handle all communications via a Web interface, just so we can provide the options to opt in or out on any communication.
JM Rodgers brings together an importer/exporter/drawback claimant, steamship lines, U.S. Customs, truckers, airlines, forwarding partners and all kinds of individuals and companies into a common ground. We collect data from all these parties but it is a fact that this data is forgotten. For instance, once an importer moves a commodity, Customs collects their duty and all parties are paid for their services, the data for all parties is just forgotten. We, at JMR, could literally drill down freight management data, Customs data and all kinds of adjacent data that left alone has no value, but put together could represent great business opportunities for all of our clients.
In essence, once we get all data, we can build procedures and controls so that the same information gets disseminated any way our client wants to anybody they want. The best part is that while the forwarding partner, our clients’ offices, our agents and all parties see their information in their own different formats, our clients can see the whole picture just by going to their Web site that we are customizing for their accounts. This is the central point of our relationship with our clients. A client will be able to check rates, shipments, contact our personnel and do many useful day-to-day tasks at their own pace and at their own convenience. The fact that we are rendering all of this data on one place compels us to find a more precise way of getting the data to our clients.
In summary, all our IT solutions: Web development, EDI implementation, VPN communication or a simple spreadsheet. We at JMR, are willing to go the extra mile to satisfy the IT needs of all our customers.