Until now, every logistics company used individual track & trace solutions for their track & trace processes – and each solution speaks a different language, which complicates the collaboration of service providers along the supply chain. In particular, the status terms within the transport process are, as of now, not clearly defined: Track & trace status messages are usually transmitted digitally, but not labelled uniformly. “Out for delivery,” “In transit,” or “Shipped” often mean the same thing, but can lead to misinterpretations. Some logistics service providers use more than 150 track & trace events. Subcontractors and logistics service providers often spend considerable effort exchanging information at these events.
The overarching goal of the Working Group Track & Trace is the creation of an event, notification, and data model on an open source basis. For this purpose, its members began by collecting event designations to later reduce and standardise them. The Working Group proceeded according to the IT principle of “backwards engineering.” Everything was designed starting from the end of the supply chain, from the customer’s perspective. What events does the customer want to see? What is really relevant for them? This way, a model could be developed that reflects the actual information needed. After all, the customer must be satisfied with the logistics process, which is tied to their business process. The partners also agreed to initially consider only direct transport. The goal was to achieve the lowest complexity factor. In close collaboration and feedback loops within the large group, the Working Group agreed on an event model. This is intended to enable optimised data exchange for logistics service providers, subcontractors, and customers alike.
The standard event model consists of a clearly defined sequence of track & trace events that represent two central scenarios: The so-called “Happy Path” outlines the ideal transport process along the chain from the handover of the shipment to final delivery using ten terminologies. Logistics service providers start with “Order Confirmed” and “Heading towards loading station.” After “Loading arrival” and “Loading departure, ”the process continues into “Customs.” Then it proceeds via “Heading towards loading station” and “Arriving unloading” to completed delivery (“Delivered”), until finally, after the “POD” event, the process is completed (“Order Finished”). The reduced complexity streamlines the process structure and lowers potential costs for the logistics service providers and subcontractors. Deviations from the regular transport process are represented in an “Unhappy Path” with another twelve terminologies, such as “Wrong Location,” “Driver Unavailable,” or “Vehicle Breakdown.”
Expansion to other scenarios
The new track & trace event model forms a basic architecture for all players who carry out transport or manage events. Provided as an open source model in the Repository of the Open Logistics Foundation, each company can decide whether to integrate these events into its track & trace system. The current model is aligned with the starting point “Road Transport: LSP & Customer.” The goal of the Working Group is to expand the topic of track & trace to further scenarios and logistics disciplines in the future. For this, in addition to desired feedback, ambassadors – those who take the topic outward – are especially important.
