Owners of a North Lincolnshire family run haulage business, Estuary Freight Services Ltd, say their operation has been transformed since having a dedicated transport management system (TMS) installed during the first lockdown in 2020.
The new Mandata Go transport management system they implemented has also allowed the business to grow throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
Estuary Freight Services, who are based in Immingham, near Grimsby, aims to continue growing their fleet of ten vehicles. Specialising in agricultural transportation, but also operating in sectors like transporting timber and waste, the business owners say they’ve vastly reduced time-consuming paperwork and manual processes, and improved visibility since implementing Mandata Go.
Mandata Go has allowed Estuary Freight Services to automate all areas of their haulage operation. From planning and job allocation to invoicing and electronic proof of delivery (ePODs), onto one paperless and fully accessible cloud-based software solution.
Jade Brewster, managing director at Estuary Freight said: “It’s not an underestimation to say we simply could not have continued much longer with the way we were running our operations. We relied on spreadsheets that were difficult to keep updated with the latest information, hand-written notes and reports, alongside numerous time-consuming phone calls to drivers out on the road. Because of these issues, it meant that it was difficult to keep our customers informed in case of any sudden changes to deliveries or job status.
“Not only has Mandata Go helped us to fully automate many of our processes, it’s saved us so much time due by avoiding duplication of work. Mandata Go allowed us to invoice with ePODs attached, providing an instant solution to handling any historic customer queries. We’ve been able to confidently take on far more work than we previously may have hoped for and grow the business accordingly with the time we’ve saved.”
She added: “We’ve professionalised how we look and now have consistent branding for delivery notes and invoicing that includes our logo and colour scheme. All of our drivers get all of the information they need on their mobile device in one consistent format. Business growth means we’re still as busy as ever, but we can now work far more efficiently.
“We used to hand write weekly running sheets for crucial performance-related elements of the business, including for our own trucks and for our subbies. Now we can do this at the click of a button, and look back at our performance by running a report in seconds.”
Mandata Group offers haulage and logistics software solutions for a wide variety of haulage operators, from one-vehicle operatives through to those with many hundreds of vehicles on the road at any one time. Road transport operators from all sectors of the industry use Mandata to manage their processes from order to execution and invoice and counts the likes of other hauliers Skelcher Express and TRS Tyres, among its customer base.
