Turners Distribution

“It was mayhem before e-docs”

The Company
Turners (Soham) Ltd is a family-owned business which was founded in 1930 by Wallace and Frank Turner. They are one of the largest privately owned transport companies in the UK and were voted “UK Transport Company of the Year 2000” by the Institute of Transport Management. Turners operate 800 vehicles and have 1300 employees throughout the UK. They have 17 depots plus an operating centre in the Netherlands and have expanded to five times their original size in the last seven years.

In this time they have gained considerable experience in meeting the demands of their customers - who range from the major retailers to dedicated government contracts with USAF and HM Prison Services. Their largest areas of operation are in temperature-controlled distribution and in bulk tanker operations – and their experience in these areas has marked Turners as a formidable force within the haulage industry.

The Problem
By 1998, managing the influx of Proof of Deliveries (POD’s) and other essential haulage documents became a herculean task. Turners were finding impossible to deal with the situation, as there were 1200 delivery notes a week being generated at the Exning depot alone.

Sharyn Turner, Administration Manager at the depot explained how bad the situation had become: “POD’s were photocopied, then the information had to be faxed back to the customer and then it was posted. We needed three copiers to cope with the quantity of work, which were expensive to run with that level of output. If one of them broke down, which they always did, it caused serious problems which were devastating to the efficiency of our existing systems - it was mayhem! Without e-docs we would have had to employ at least another two people. It has transformed this department”.

The Solution
With the new document imaging system installed, delivery data could be e-docs-facilitated within 24 hours, enabling electronic routing back to the customer. Sharyn Turner adds: “Now when customers ring in we can call up their details and e-mail their POD over to them whilst on the phone. The system has become outstandingly effective and all the paperwork is processed efficiently and quickly by the end of the week. Our customers are very impressed, e-docs has enabled us to accelerate processing time with improved levels of customer service and overall efficiency. The whole system runs smoothly and the savings are significant”.

The Result
Key benefits which have been identified include substantially improved levels of customer service, dramatically reduced administration time and significantly reduced administration costs. Turners’ other depots have now expressed strong interest in using e-docs and there is also scope for using the system with Supplier Delivery Records, load plans and gate house passes as well as the accounts sections.

Graham Doe, Finance Director at Turners, concludes: “the use of e-docs to control our POD's has decreased the debtor days for our customers and increased the efficiency of our distribution centre”.