FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Vision Audit Technology Improves Order Fulfillment Accuracy While Lowering Operational Costs

The saying, a picture is worth a thousand words is never truer than when it comes to arming your distribution operation and customer service department with the tools needed to resolve shipment disputes in your favor!

The High Cost of Shipping Errors

Industry studies show that the internal labor costs for resolving shipping disputes is $50 to $75 per incident. Potentially many times higher based on the industry. This includes the cost of communicating with the customer, researching the issue internally, formulating a response, and re-shipping the order. The actual freight charges as well as the product cost need to be calculated and added to the cost.

The return logistics costs can add $50 or more to the above costs when including receiving, repackaging, re-stocking and inventory adjustments. Even organizations that pride themselves on order accuracy can incur internal costs that add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars every year.

Inventory Losses. Not all shipping errors involve customer complaints. Weaknesses in order validation controls lead to over-shipments or wrong product shipments that never get acknowledged by the customer. In some businesses, losses of this type can be detrimental.

Perhaps the most critical factor—in a customer’s decision to buy, is the vendor’s ability to deliver accurately, quickly, and completely. In the Internet age, customers have less and less tolerance for errors, communication gaps, and inefficiency. Organizations that excel in customer service gain market share at the expense of those that do not. Wasted, non-value labor throughout your supply chain!!!

Numina Group developed and provides two versions of Vision Audit control modules for performing in-line validation. The base product, Vision Pack and Audit, VPAK, supports real-time image capture, along with the case barcode, and weight and dimensioning of cartons as they are transported or conveyed from picking-packing operations.

Both modules capture high-resolution digital images of the case contents from the top, front, and side of full cases as the carton is conveyed. While conveyed an in-motion scale provides a weight audit of the carton. The image, case weight, and product barcode data are captured, and the data time stamped and stored with the high resolution images in the RDS SQL database. Cases outside of the expected weight limits are automatically diverted to the inspection area.

While weight, case UPC barcode, and dimensional data are excellent measurement technology for use in order validation, there is still the element of proof needed regarding customer disputes. It is impossible to eliminate doubts, and in many instances perform the validation process without vision technology. A real-time digital picture can 100% confirm the correctness of order/case shipments. Vision gives your operation an irrefutable image record of the item(s), the ability to eliminate mistakes before they leave the building, and the capability to e-mail this information to the customer to prove the shipment. Vision improves customer service, aids in training, reduces the labor involved in issue resolution, improves inventory accuracy, and immediately adds profit to the company’s bottom line.

For a number of clients, the investment in VCAS can be recouped in a matter of months. Below is the example of a current Wine and Spirits Distributor: Because of daily and seasonal fluctuations, the facility ships 15,000 to 30,000 cases per day over one or two shifts.

Using conservative error rate of .2%, 30 errors were being identified and corrected per day. Prior to VCAS many of these shipments resulted in a customer complaint; however, in situations where higher value items or quantities were shipped, these errors were rarely reported by customers. In addition to the 30 incorrect shipments the clients’ customer service department handles daily, several complaints on orders that were picked and delivered correctly were also incurred. Higher volume installations are realizing savings 200% or greater than the savings shown below on a yearly basis.

With Vision Audit, distribution facilities have on-line automated inspection 24 hour a day, seven days a week. Vision Audit eliminates shipping errors, reduces operating costs, improves profits, and eliminates the mistakes that jeopardize customer relationships.

The technology exists to perform real-time imaging and analysis to detect errors before shipment, and provide conclusive evidence of what was picked, packed, and shipped during distribution operations. Shipment errors can be resolved quickly, fairly, and soundly. Vision Audit streamlines operations, reduces internal costs, and provides the tools needed to turn a potentially negative situation with a customer into a positive one.

The Numina Group is one of the USA’s leading independent material handling automation suppliers. The firm has been an industry innovator since 1986. The Numina Group provides a full family of automation solutions for manufacturing and distribution control applications.

Numina Group’s family of application control modules are armed with RDS, Real-time Distribution System, a highly scalable, modular and easily customized automation platform. It’s the USA’s #1 Linux based Warehouse Control and Execution platform, proven in hundreds of demanding installations. RDS drastically lowers cost through the use of pre-developed application modules for controlling picking, order validation, packing, labeling, and sorting in distribution operations. The results are a highly reliable operation, and reduction in time and effort for clients to fulfill orders.

Our products and services improve distribution and warehouse operations. Numina Group’s application expertise, innovative technology, and software, “automate out” the bottlenecks and excessive labor, resulting in increased efficiency and rapid ROI. We optimize all stages of order fulfillment by implementing Smarter, Faster, and Better Distribution Automation.