In today’s highly competitive business environment where a small administrative or cost change can cause a tremendous gain and growth, carrying out a parcel audit should not be underestimated. Hiring one of the top small parcel auditing companies in USA will not only help you gain more insight on your shipping, but it can also help you lower your shipping costs with service audit, rate negotiations and claims filling among others. You must realize that a minor contractual error that is repeated many times can lead to significant increases in your business shipping cost. The auditor will scrutinize every line item on the parcel invoice in a bid to find opportunities that can drive down the cost. The auditor will also look for savings opportunities that can help renegotiate the contract rates.
The auditing process will also collect essential shipping data in easy to understand formats that you can use to make essential logistics and service improvement decisions. It will be impossible to manage what you cannot measure, which makes it essential to have detailed reports. The audit process will thoroughly evaluate every shipment on every invoice to help uncover misapplied rates, overcharges, and unfulfilled service guarantees among others. An effective parcel auditing can lead up to 6 percent weekly cost savings and contract negotiation cost savings of between 10 and 20 percent. The key areas that a proper audit should focus on include:
Rate audit: The rate audit should ensure that you are charged as per the agreed negotiated rates including the negotiated incentives, discounts and other agreed terms of the service. The audit will consider all billable aspects including the weight, zone, and service to ensure that every product is invoiced correctly.
Billing adjustments: In some occasions, an address correction from the address given on the manifest and the actual delivery can result in an invoiced accessorial charge irrespective of the extent of the difference. The audit should review all the accessorial charges to ensure they are only applied appropriately.
Late Shipments: An audit will help find out the packages that were not delivered on time and the reason for late delivery. Finding out packages that were not delivered on time within a short period will enable you to file for compensation if there was no late delivery waiver.
Compliance: The audit should also look for duplicate shipments, invalid shipments, and provide details of lost and damaged shipments enabling you to file for damage claims.
Conclusion
While auditing your shipment process is a necessity, hiring an auditing firm to carry the process is advantageous. This is because it offers a better return on your investment than carrying an internal audit. Firms also have better resources enabling the businesses to maximize potential returns.
