On behalf of Conloxx, an expert for digital processes in transport logistics, the logistics and organizational consultancy Prolog-Team took a detailed look at the question of how freight purchasing is handled in practice. To this end, 55 medium-sized mechanical and plant engineering companies were surveyed on their daily price management in freight purchasing. The results are in part surprising, and in some cases even alarming.

Systematically evaluate transport service providers
The basic prerequisites for efficient freight purchasing at daily prices include clearly defined responsibilities within the company and assigning the task to the right department. But there is already a problem here: In around 25 percent of the companies surveyed, the technical purchasing departments are involved in the procurement of low-cost transportation services. This is not very effective, as the core competencies of purchasers lie in the procurement of production materials. Shipping and logistics departments, on the other hand, usually have the necessary practical experience to determine which carrier offers the best transportation service. They are able to systematically evaluate transportation service providers.

It is also important to clearly assign responsibilities. Otherwise, structured and organized freight purchasing is not possible. "To ensure that individual departments are not overloaded, it makes sense to use a digital freight allocation system," says logistics consultant Martin Stoll, Managing Director of Prolog-Team. Systems such as GET-Rates simplify the process noticeably. Technical purchasing is relieved and shipping efficiency increases noticeably. For example, manual evaluation of offers is no longer necessary.

Audit security comes up short
For around two thirds of survey participants, compliance and audit compliance are important aspects of their freight purchasing. In concrete terms, this means that legal provisions and the company's own defined code of conduct are observed throughout the entire tendering process. In particular, this includes ensuring that freight buyers position themselves in competition within the framework of the applicable laws. This includes avoiding arbitrary or unobjective preferential treatment of individual bidders. In this way, fair competition is ensured. In addition, documents relating to the award of a contract are subject to retention requirements. Audit-proof electronic archiving requires, among other things, the storage of the original documents.

Paradoxically, around 70 percent of machine and plant manufacturers handle their freight purchasing by telephone, e-mail and fax. However, this routine is in blatant contradiction to compliance and audit compliance, as these means of communication often do not guarantee legally compliant transportation processing. This results in non-transparent processes when purchasing transportation and awarding contracts. The likelihood of misleading communication with carriers and incorrect transport processing increases. "If you want to keep the scope for breaches of compliance guidelines and audit compliance as narrow as possible while ensuring efficient communication with carriers, you can play it safe with freight software," says Stoll. On the one hand, such systems generate transparent processes when purchasing transportation and awarding contracts, as they evaluate all offers objectively and automatically. On the other hand, they enable maximum audit security thanks to the seamless automatic archiving of all relevant data.

Time-consuming freight purchasing
The use of unsuitable communication methods also significantly increases the time it takes to process a transport order. For around a quarter of companies, it takes more than 30 minutes from the request to the awarding of the contract - the standard value is around five to ten minutes. So there is an urgent need for action. "Another tricky aspect is the common practice of machine and plant manufacturers to request a freight order from only one to three carriers. This approach is not compatible with the compliance guidelines," emphasizes Conloxx Managing Director Thomas Selbach. However, enquiring with several transport service providers is time-consuming: Companies quickly reach their limits due to the high time expenditure of more than 30 minutes. Here too, digital freight allocation systems offer a solution. GET-Rates, for example, generates offers from previously defined favorite carriers with just a single entry. Optionally, the software suggests suitable and reliable carriers for each request based on the stored parameters.