The Transportation Management System (TMS) — friend to the fleet leader, foe to the competitor.
A successful TMS is flexible, capable, and oftentimes integrated, offering ample benefits in today's transportation sector. Not all Transportation Management Systems, however, are parallel with the modern age. Ideally, a TMS should work as a support tool that propels your business goals and objectives forward.
TMS: Looking beyond the acronym
A TMS is a system that enables fleet professionals across the transportation sector — from carriers to distributors to manufacturers — to manage the planning, executing, and optimizing of their incoming and outgoing products. It's a tool that takes the products you have coming and going and streamlines the planning process to ensure smooth transportation and distribution of goods. A trucking-focused TMS is comprised of precise capabilities geared toward for-hire and private trucking operations.
Combining a robust TMS with a powerful professional driver workflow app is one way to define a successful integration. Integrations play a crucial role in how beneficial a TMS is. From a driver, dispatcher, and fleet management perspective, an enhanced TMS with flexible integration capabilities helps streamline the exchange of vital data, such as workflow and positioning data.
Differentiating driver and dispatcher benefits
With a TMS, dispatchers are able to easily view customer, load, and shipping data and then electronically send the pertinent information to the driver. While a comprehensive TMS can help your teams in many ways, the benefits an integrated TMS offers to drivers and dispatchers are inherently unique.
When the TMS is combined with an enhanced professional driver workflow app, like Omnitracs Drive, a conduit is formed between the dispatcher and driver. When integrated, a dispatcher can utilize the TMS and see vital driver information, such as hours of service (HOS) data. Additionally, dispatchers can configure the information they want to see on the TMS based on special customer and load requirements, further personalizing the customer experience.
This integration ensures every driver and dispatcher remains aware of load data critical to their day-to-day processes and customer satisfaction.
This works in three steps:
- The dispatcher views real-time load data through the TMS.
- The dispatcher transports essential load data to the driver.
- The driver will see that load data in their driver workflow application.
The leading fleet intelligence provider provides leading TMS solutions
When a TMS is integrated with an application like Omnitracs Drive, you can combine up to 30 data points from across your applications and integrate them with your TMS. Planning and optimization are made all the more straightforward through a thorough understanding of what your data is and how it can enhance your driver’s day-to-day workflow.
Some examples of available data points from an Omnitracs Drive-TMS centric integration are:
- Load assignments
- Arrival and departure information
- Asset positions
- Vehicle assignments
- Document imaging
- Shipper and consignee stop info
- HOS
At Omnitracs, we cater to your unique business needs by having the flexibility to integrate with a comprehensive range of providers, from certified partner integration providers to managed service integration providers. Further, you can utilize productized integrations, meaning integrations are certified where they can be and thoroughly tested and vetted.
These capabilities, in conjunction with our continuously evolving approach, leave you in trusted hands for your Transportation Management System integration needs and beyond.
Learn more about Omnitracs TMS solutions today! For additional information on the benefits of an integrated TMS, read our blog article on the driver workflow and TMS experience.