close to heart

At the forefront of digitalization

with an open mind

These past years digitalization has been high on Scandic Trans’ priority list. Together with the company’s own system vendor, with Johan Lövdahl at the forefront, one has focused on automating order handling, invoicing, purchase ledgers and customer reporting.

Text: Anna Sand • Photo: Anna Sand

– Much more than you think can be automated, states CEO Mikael Löfqvist together with Johan Lövdahl, who works with the company’s invoicing, but who also has made the digitalization his own ”baby”.

The outset for the development that is happening is mainly governed by the demands from EU, the customers’ demands as well as the new technology and the opportunities it creates. Add involvement and an open mind and you have a winning concept, something that also has been recognized within the industry. – A Finnish program and expert company for transport handling, that provides the industry, wholesale trade and retail trade online the advantages of a transparent transport deal, recently named Scandic Trans the best transport company when it comes to reporting, Löfqvist tells us.

The development concerns the whole chain of processes within the company and starts already at the order handling. – The bookings today happen mainly so, that the customer via EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) connects to our order handling system, or via our own web portal, where the clients have their own login. The customer can at the same time choose which updates he or she wants for the transport and see the current status of the order, Löfqvist explains.

The customer also directly receives the transport price – the days of waiting for a quotation is over. – The pricing system has developed enormously and two thirds of our clients today has digital deals with automated pricing. The fact that the system suggests a ready price is revolutionizing to us, states Johan, who developed the system in close collaboration with the system vendor.

The automated pricing directly affects the invoicing, which thanks to this always is exact and up to date and the need for post crediting is basically nonexistent.

Almost all customers nowadays demand or want delivery notification, which has led to an increased work load for the transport management. – The notification system will soon be automated with the help of geofencing. When the vehicle, equipped with a GPS transmitter, approaches the geographically limited geofence area, the personnel in charge receives an automatic notification regarding the incoming haulage, Johan explains.

After unloading, the customer has the possibility to directly receive an electronic version of the waybill – and not only that, but also, if necessary, pictures of possibly damaged goods and other necessary documents. – We are still one of few players within the industry that offer this, Löfqvist states.

The same goes for the customer specific emissions reports, which become more and more requested as the sustainability demands

increase. – Our own emissions calculations and measuring systems are also continuously developed. Thanks to AI – artificial intelligence – the systems develop themselves gradually and at the same time we keep our eyes open for new possibilities to develop – even for services that no one yet has requested, Lövdahl continues. – Together with our system vendor we function a bit like product developers, which incites both parties. One condition is of course a good dialogue

Together with the system developer and the program provider Scandic Trans continuously develop both their internal system and the services and reporting to the customers. – During the past year Scandic Trans has managed to become almost paperless, Johan Lövdahl tells us.