Whether your shipment is high value or simply needs to get to its destination as soon as possible, any delays could cause big problems. There are risks with both road and air freight that have to be managed to ensure urgent deliveries can be fulfilled.
Smart platforms and tracking technologies can support in identifying and dealing with issues, but nothing beats a team’s experience of real-world risks. Understanding these possibilities and proactively putting steps in place to mitigate them is essential to keeping time-critical shipments moving.
What are the main risks in time-critical logistics?
Depending on delivery locations, there will be different risks to a time-critical shipment. Whether you’re sending a package via road or air freight will also impact on the types of difficulties you’ll face.
Traffic
Both on the roads and in the air, congestion can stop progress and cause deliveries to miss their arrival window. Whether an accident is blocking a route, changing road conditions are causing traffic to slow, or delays to air traffic have pushed back your take-off time, traffic can quickly build and cause problems for time-critical shipments.
Crossings and customs issues
Border crossings have the potential to cause major supply chain disruption, including delays to time-critical shipments. If a carrier’s customs documents are incomplete or inaccurate, this can lead to long wait times at a border. Increased inspections or bureaucracy due to increased security risks can also lead to customs bottlenecks and lead to severe, costly delays.
Meteorologic issues
Sudden changes or extremes in weather conditions can mean transport is rerouted or brought to a complete halt. Storms, earthquakes, floods and extreme winds, rain, sleet or snow can mean roads and runways become impassable. Safety concerns can lead services to be cancelled or severely delayed.
Political disruption
It’s not just striking borders, customs and airline staff that need to be considered. Strikes, unrest and demonstrations can make it unsafe or impossible to get your time-critical shipment to its destination. Whether citizens are heading out on the streets to protest or purposefully staying at home rather than going to work, it can disrupt deliveries.
IT
Infrastructure issues, cybersecurity breaches and power outages are just some of the risks that can disrupt the IT systems which process shipments. From customs to air traffic control and live tracking, significant parts of time-critical logistics are supported by digital solutions, so if any part ‘goes dark’ it can have a knock on effect, particularly if a security risk shuts systems down.
Mechanical failure
In this day and age, you might not think a van or airplane breakdown could cause major issues. However, if one vehicle goes down and a quick repair or replacement isn’t possible, then a shipment might not even leave the depot. Similarly, if a driver or pilot falls sick and another colleague can’t be bought in, then significant delays could follow.
What steps can be taken to minimise these risks?
Not all delays or disruptions can be predicted or prevented, particularly when it comes to traffic. However, it is possible to put some mitigations in place to give a time-critical shipment the best chance of reaching its destination.
Planning and early intervention
Running risk assessments and putting in appropriate contingency planning is the best approach to ensure time-critical shipments are delivered on time. For example, if flooding is predicted on a delivery route, then air freight might be a more appropriate option than road transport.
Having the right systems in place to maintain complete visibility also means if live issues come up, interventions can be put in place quickly to minimise disruption. A combination of expert teams and technologies mean shipments can be closely monitored, wherever they are in the world.
For example, our portal brings together live feeds from various systems (data on channel crossings, customs, traffic, historical transit time and GPS). This information is processed and categorised based on a traffic light system:
- Red jobs have to be urgently checked and actions taken by one of our team
- Amber indicates we may have an issue or an issue may arise
- Green signals that there are no issues, the transport is on target for delivery.
This helps our team identify the most urgent issues and act quickly to correct errors or find alternative solutions. Although the team is supported by technology, only humans can make the interventions required to keep time-critical shipments on track.
Such as when, recently, the port of Calais and Dunkerque were blockaded due to industrial action. By making an early change of crossings from the ferries to the Eurotunnel, our team avoided lengthy delays in a shipment’s delivery.
In short, combining technologies and team expertise gives visibility that makes decisions quicker, anticipates issues and finds alternative solutions to delivering shipments on time.
Customs management
Depending on where your time-critical shipment is being delivered, the customs requirements will be different. Making sure you’ve got all the right documents and have filled them out accurately is a difficult task to perform under pressure. However, it’s essential if you’re to get the right clearance to keep the border crossing as smooth as possible.
Using digital documents and AI tools can significantly speed up the process by ensuring consistency and compliance with whichever border authority you’re working. Our platforms can be integrated with yours to make this process even easier.
Alternatively, you can drop your documents off with our team for them to process. As experts in different requirements and regulations across various jurisdictions, they can secure clearance faster and tie it directly to your booking. Both systems mean you can get clearance ahead of crossing the border, meaning you don’t have to worry about getting stopped.
24/7 monitoring
Issues can arise at any time, and every minute counts when it comes to hitting a specific delivery window. By keeping an eye on a shipment around the clock, our team can proactively mitigate any blockages or delays, even if they happen in the middle of the night.
It also means goods can be collected within two hours anywhere in Europe, even if it’s early in the morning or late at night. This means the most urgent deliveries can be fulfilled with minimal stress. Plus, customers can trust that they have an accurate picture of where their time-critical shipment is at any hour of the day.
Find out more about our digital platforms here.