What is the purpose of a Bill of Lading?

A Bill of Lading is a document issued by a consignor (or shipper, such as an order fulfillment center) and signed by a carrier at the time of pick up, acknowledging that specified products have been received on board as cargo for delivery to a named consignee, or destination. It serves as a contract between the shipper and/ or owners of the goods and the carrier for a number of purposes:

• It is evidence of a valid contract of carriage, and may incorporate the complete terms of the contract between the shipper (such as a startup ecommerce order fulfillment servce) and the carrier which may include payment terms, rates, description of product classification, as well as other duties and obligations.

• It is a receipt signed by the carrier confirming whether goods matching the contract description have been received in good condition (see SLC below). The information could include pallet and/ or piece count, weight, product description and classification.

• Once signed by the consignee, it is a receipt of goods received providing final confirmation of the quantity and condition of the product received. A signature by the consignee is acknowledgement the goods are received as described on the BOL unless discrepancies are otherwise noted at the time the BOL is signed.

• The signed BOL may also often serve as a Proof of Delivery (POD) document as well as back up for the Freight Invoice.

The Bill of Lading will typically at minimum contain the following information: Shipper’s Name and Address, Consignee’s Name and Address, Description of Goods including pieces and weight, NMFC Classification, Bill to Party (or Payment Terms), relevant load ID numbers, and Carrier’s Name.

As a matter of process, the driver from the carrier will sign the BOL at the time of pick up when the goods are loaded onto the carrier’s equipment. At this point the carrier is responsible for inspecting the goods to ensure the quantity and condition of the product is as noted on the BOL. Depending on the shipper’s rules, the BOL can be signed “Shipper Load and Count”, or “SLC”, which means the carrier has not been given the opportunity to inspect the goods prior to loading when it is not practical or permissible. A copy of the signed BOL will often be kept be the consignor.

The original copy of the BOL will physically accompany the shipment from pick up through delivery.

Upon delivery of the shipment to the consignee, the receiving location will inspect the product as it is unloaded – prior to signing the BOL acknowledging receipt. Any damages or shortages will be noted by the consignee on the BOL at that time. Generally speaking, if a consignee notices damages at a later time and nothing was noted on the BOL at the time of delivery the shipper and carrier will not be held accountable for the issues. An executed, final signed copy of the BOL will be retained by the consignee as a receipt of the shipment delivered. The carrier will retain a final copy of the Bill of Lading as well.

Visit http://www.eroutinguide.com/ for a complimentary Bill of Lading generator tool.
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Ken Kowal is Director of New Business Development for order fulfillment service company Landis Logistics.

6 Reasons why a Routing Guide is crucial for effective Transportation Management

What is a Routing Guide?

A Routing Guide is a document whose purpose is to outline the rules that govern how a company’s shipments should be handled. This could include any shipment ranging from small package, airfreight, import/export, to full truckloads of product. The goal is provide a document with straight forward instructions detailing what carrier and account numbers are to be used for any given shipment when the cost will be paid for by that company.

To illustrate, a Routing Guide would specify the correct way to send a shipment in the following sample situations:

• What company to use for sending office correspondence (Fed Ex or UPS?) and what account number to use: the best answer may be different depending on service required such as over-night or ground.
• The correct Less-than- Truckload carrier to use when a buyer has purchased product from a supplier and the order needs to be delivered to one of your locations: LTL tariffs are complicated and certain carries may be cheaper depending on the origin and destination for a given shipment.

Any time a shipment is being routed on behalf of your company, and the cost is hitting your bottom line, it is important to make sure the correct routing decision gets made. A good Routing Guide ensures that happens.

What happens without an effective Routing Guide?

Having a clear, concise Routing Guide is of particular importance when a company is decentralized geographically, has multiple locations, or a large supplier/ vendor base.
When the correct routing is not followed several negative things can happen.

• Product is routed with the wrong carrier resulting in potentially bad service and higher cost
• Product arrives at the wrong location
• Packaging may be incorrect or sub-standard
• Bill of Lading, filled out incorrectly or shipments will have incomplete documentation , interrupting the receiving process at your facility
• Freight Invoices are incorrectly rated or sent to the wrong address for payment, delaying payment
• Shipping volume will not be recognized when volume discounts are part of a contract

As part of a Routing Guide, specific packaging and paperwork requirements you need suppliers and vendors to be mindful of can be spelled out. For instance – do you need pallets to be stacked less than a certain height to fit in your facility’s racks? Do you require an Advanced Shipping Notification or Purchase Order number noted on the Bill of Lading for the product to be received properly? There are many low cost and free Transportation Software solutions offering tools for helping to create and distribute your Routing Guide.

Routing Guides are intended to be dynamic documents. Make sure you have a process to update and distribute the Routing Guide to your entire vendor base and across internal departments as updates are made. If the updates are not disseminated effectively then the instructions will become quickly outdated and miss-routed and/ or miss-rated shipments will occur.

Not having an up to date Routing Guide creates extra cost and hassles for a company, so make sure your Routing Guide document is current and widely distributed.