Nov/Dec 2004

Express parcels company Amtrak has adopted NetDespatch's Web-based tracking system so that all its customers, regardless of volumes, will be able to book, label and track shipments online.

Amtrak's own PC-based InTouch tracking system is said to account for 30 per cent of traffic, but is limited to 1,000 high-volume customers.

Bookings made by Amtrak's customers using NetDespatch are immediately available to Amtrak's depot network, so collections and deliveries can be planned in real time. New automated processing will address-check, generate bar-coded labels on the spot, and synchronise immediately with Amtrak's central systems.

NetDespatch had already been providing the Amtrak OnLine Collections service. "Since it is hosted, it is not physically replacing anything," points out Joe Dudley, Amtrak's business services manager. "We are always kept at the forefront of technological innovation as we are buying into an evolving service, not just a software product.

 

"It also makes any of our own updates, such as postcode and service code, very simple, as one update on the server automatically feeds out to everyone."