Appointment Scheduling: Turn Loads Faster

Manhattan Associates' Appointment Scheduling works with Yard Management to coordinate shipping and receiving processes with carriers at distribution centers.

Appointment Scheduling enables carriers to easily self-schedule their needs for warehouse labor. This helps carriers remain on schedule and comply with Hours of Service regulations. The key benefit to you: Turn more loads in less time—with no delays or charge-backs.

With dynamic scheduling of shipments at a facility, you can better allocate the time and resources required to move product in the yard and to load and unload shipments at the docks. This enables management to more effectively measure yard and dock task durations. In turn, duration metrics reveal unnecessary "dwell time" in the yard.

Here's how Appointment Scheduling works.

1. Your carriers and suppliers easily schedule appointments using electronic data interchange (EDI) or a Web interface. This eliminates delays and errors from time-consuming phone calls and faxes.
2. Appointment times and appropriate resource allocations at distribution centers are system-generated. Load balancing can take place across shifts to level resource requirements.
3. Appointment Scheduling automatically calculates load times based on required delivery dates, order content, dock capacity, warehouse capacity and labor requirements.
4. The solution tracks status from guard check-in to check-out, measures detention times and monitors load and unload times.

Shipper Beware: Hours of Service Rules Allow Charge-backs

With Hours of Service in the U.S., the Working Time Directive in Europe and other government regulations, carriers have less tolerance for costly delays. If they experience delays at your distribution center, carriers can add charges to recover lost productivity and revenue. Through better planning and scheduling, you can avoid these charge-backs.

Contact Information: To learn more about Manhattan Associates' supply chain solutions, simply complete the information request form, and we will contact you. For North & South America, call +1 877.596.9208 or e-mail info_americas@manh.com. For global inquiries, call +44 (0)1344 318000 or e-mail info_global@manh.com.