Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility Buyer's Guide

Introduction

Are you or your customers looking for up-to-date information about ocean shipments and container locations? Do you know where some of your containers are, but not their status (especially in ports and terminals)? Is your business growing and are you having to manually check carrier portals, which could be causing workflow bottlenecks? Such challenges are why we created an innovative technology called Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility, a leading-edge solution that allows shippers, freight forwarders, brokers, and 3PLs to track and monitor ocean shipments in real-time and focus on those shipments at risk.

To help you evaluate the solution, we developed this buyer’s guide to not only cover what the solution does, but also to explain how each of its features can benefit you. Our goal is to help you determine if the technology is the right match for your business, provide a clear overview of how our purchasing process works, and how the solution can help you elevate operations. This guide covers:

• Quick Overview: What Is Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility?
• Determine Your Needs: What Are Your Top Pain Points?
• What Are the Key Features of the Solution & Why Do They Matter to You?
• What Should You Look for in Best-in-Class Ocean Shipment Tracking Technology?
• Success Story: A Customer that is Using Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility to Thrive
• How Does the Buying Process Work?
• Next Steps & Cost Savings

Quick Overview: What's an Ocean Visibility Platform?

An ocean visibility solution can add value to transportation management by extending and automating connectivity to and from stakeholders across the ocean supply chain. It enables you to make informed business decisions, reduce the time and effort required to track container shipments, minimize demurrage fees, and provide accurate shipment status information. Our solution does this by collecting a comprehensive data set from 70+ carriers, 500+ ports/terminals/ramps, the top co-loaders, as well as U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

From an operational perspective, this means that you can view where your ocean containers are located, what their status is, and know at-a-glance if the shipment is at risk and if you need to take any action. From a stakeholder-facing perspective, the technology can help you provide updates via an on-demand web-based portal, via automated emails, or other existing customer-facing systems. With U.S. Customs clearance data also available as part of Descartes MacroPoint’s data set, the solution has the most complete and accurate source of actionable ocean location & status data available from one technology provider.

Determine Your Needs: What Are Your Top Pain Points?

Before delving deeper into the features of Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility, it is important to consider your top pain points with tracking ocean shipments. We have put together a short list of the top challenges that shippers, freight forwarders, brokers and 3PLs may be facing:

• I am spending too much time checking shipment statuses in carrier portals.
• I have visibility gaps for ocean shipments and/or unreliable carrier connectivity.
• My customers are asking for alerts related to ocean shipments and container tracking.
• I am incurring high demurrage fees.
• I have no insight into the status of cargo in the port and through customs clearance.
• I need more accurate ocean shipment ETAs.
• I need automated status updates for better planning in my Transportation Management System (TMS).
• Operational workflow is not automatically triggered by key events in the ocean shipment journey.
• I am concerned about the security of my data and need a solution that will keep my information safe.

What Are the Key Features of the Solution & Why Do They Matter to You?

The features of Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility were developed to not only counter many of the top pain points that shippers, freight forwarders, brokers, and 3PLs face, but were designed to increase efficiencies in operations. Please carefully review and evaluate the features to determine if they align with your individual business needs and would provide benefits for your operations:

Reducing Demurrage Fees

An additional benefit of the broad information set is fact-based data to counter demurrage fees. With demurrage fees hitting an average of $664 globally and fees topping $8.9 billion between 2020 and 2022, shippers, freight brokers, and 3PLS are keen to combat these costs.

The Descartes MacroPoint platform’s data set features container port in-gating and out-gating times so freight teams can know exactly when a container left or returned to a port. Should a freight organization incur a demurrage fee from a carrier that claims that a container was not returned on time, Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility enables organizations to dispute such charges with time-stamped, fact-based information.

The Richest Data Set & What This Means for You

One powerful feature of the Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility platform is the unparalleled data set that it collects. The solution standardizes, digitizes, and automates data collection and ensures information integrity. Data collected includes:

• Carrier Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) 315 messages, also known as an ocean status detail package, to inform stakeholders about specific events across the shipment life cycle both on the water, in the port, and for carrier inland moves.
• Satellite-based Automatic Identification System (AIS) details to pinpoint the exact location of a vessel on its journey.
• U.S. Customs & Border Protection (CBP) ocean cargo manifest messaging to gain insight into a shipment’s security filing status.

Integration, Automation & What This Means for You

The integration and automation capabilities of Descartes MacroPoint’s Ocean Visibility platform go hand-in-hand to deliver insight and efficiency for all company types with ocean freight shipments. The data integrates with Descartes’ TMS platforms and other 3rd-party platforms via EDI, Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), or other data transfer protocols. However, it is how the data is used intelligently that powers the automations and sets the technology apart.

If, for example, an Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA) was changed or missed, operational users will see at-a-glance that a shipment is at risk of arriving outside of its expected time window. From there, your TMS can be configured to trigger smart automations such as user actions or client updates to speed service.

Visibility Across Supply Chains & What This Means for Your Customers

All industries are becoming more competitive, and tools that can elevate customer service while reducing costs are critical to improve profitability and market differentiation. This is especially true in today’s environment when both internal and external stakeholders expect on-demand access to the location of ocean shipments to better plan operations.

About Sustainability

Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility can help reduce fuel emissions and eliminate paper processes. With improved efficiency, accuracy, and ability to identify potential issues in advance, avoid delays and idling trucks waiting for containers that will not be available for pickup. The technology can also reduce paperwork by enabling electronic document submission and receipt to reduce paper waste.

Data Security & What This Means for You

Modern supply chains depend on a network of many different companies to coordinate and speed the movement of goods worldwide. With 68% of business leaders feeling that cyber security risks are increasing, data security is top of mind for many freight organizations. Companies with global freight movements are particularly concerned about data security for some very good reasons:

• Using Legacy Technology?
• Housing a Rich Internal Data?
• Transferring High Volumes of Data?

Descartes MacroPoint Ocean Visibility is built upon the latest architecture using the Descartes MacroPoint and the Descartes Global Logistics Network™ (Descartes GLN™), which manages the real-time flow of information for thousands of shippers, freight forwarders, brokers, and 3PLs. Descartes MacroPoint users benefit from:

• A modern application data security structure to safeguard against cyberattacks.
• Alerts if a high-risk cyber criminal is identified as part of a status update that flows through the Descartes.
• A 24/7 network operations center that responds to security events.
• The support of Descartes MacroPoint’s dedicated in-house team of IT Security professionals.