A few months ago, I started thinking carefully about why our business wasn't making more money. It just seemed like no matter how hard we tried, we just couldn't turn a profit. Fortunately, a friend of mine suggested evaluating our shipping procedures. It didn't seem like the logical decision at the time, but since he was a successful business owner, I decided to listen to his advice. After carefully evaluating things, I realized that we really did have a few lags in our system. We went through and carefully reconfigured a few things, and it was amazing to see how much of a difference our changes made. Within a few weeks, we were able to speed things up and reduce lost packages. Read this blog to learn more.
While you package up your orders carefully, you still don't have any guarantees that your shipments will arrive in the right condition. If your orders are handled too roughly or suffer from accidental damage, then they might not survive the journey in one piece.
If you've had problems with damaged shipments in the past, then you can put impact indicators on your packaging. These indicators add a level of protection. They tell anyone who handles your orders to treat them with care; they also give you proof of damaging incidents during the shipping process.
While it makes sense to put impact indicators on your orders, you need to find the right products for your needs. To find out more, ask suppliers the following questions.
How Do Their Indicators Work?
Cargo damage indicators use a visual alert to show when an item has been subjected to a damaging incident such as an impact. However, indicators can display alerts in different ways, so you should check with suppliers to see how their products work.
For example, some products release a colored dye when they register an impact. Here, the dye stains the indicator's tracking area to show that there has been a problem. Other products might release tiny colored balls upon impact.
It's also worth talking to companies about their other damaged products. If you ship fragile products or items that need to be kept upright, then a tip and tilt damage indicator will also be useful.
Do Indicators Have Movement Compensation?
You should use impact indicators that are tailored to your shipment's needs. For example, some of your orders might not need a really sensitive monitor; others, such as fragile or breakable items might need indicators that will register any impact at all.
However, you don't want to use products that can't compensate for normal shipping movements. For example, if your orders will travel by air, then the indicators you use should be able to recognize regular aircraft movements without triggering an alarm.
Are Indicators Tamper-Proof?
Effective damage indicators should be tamper-proof. They shouldn't be easy to remove. People in the shipping process shouldn't be able to take your indicator off and replace it with a new one to hide the fact that they dropped one of your packages.
Ask companies about how well their indicators stick to packages. Look for indicators that trigger an alert if someone tries to remove them. Barcodes are also useful. If someone switched an indicator, you would know because the barcode wouldn't match your records.
To get started, contact shipment impact indicator companies and ask about their products.
Share28 October 2022
