Carriers and connection to facilities
Last updated
Last updated
The term "carrier" is used in our platform to describe shipping service providers. The carrier management allows connecting different shipping service providers simultaneously and offer various shipping options at different facilities.
The module is primarily used in combination with the order fulfillment but can also be operated headless.
The integration of carriers is relevant for:
Decisions in the Distributed Order Management (DOMS) when assigning orders to facilities
Obtaining shipping and return labels for sending parcels
Obtaining track & trace data
Automatically finishing the handover task when the carrier has picked up the parcel.
Courier, Express, and Parcel Services (CEP) refer to entities, that map shipping providers and are generally configured in fulfillmenttools. Depending on each individual setup, different CEP Providers are available.
By default, a freshly created tenant system does not show the available carriers within the Backoffice since most of the carriers are country-specific. Activating a carrier has to be done via API. After that, it can be configured within the Backoffice.
In the carrier configuration, properties such as credentials, logos, or the default parcel weight can be specified. One of the most important configurations is the attribute returnLabel. It tells fulfillmenttools systems whether a return label should be created with every label requested from the given carrier.
In the carrier services related use case a facility is a place where CEP services pick up parcels or interfacility transfers are started / finished.
Users can assign different carriers to one facility. With this information, a fencing can be implemented where orders which need to be shipped by a chosen carrier are routed to a facility where this carrier is active. Carriers that are enabled on tenant level must also be enabled for the facilities in which this carrier is available.
The Facility-To-Carrier-Connection covers configurations that allow for frictionless carrier services. The connection covers, amongst others:
cutoffTime
Value (hour and minute) describe the time when the carrier (usually) shows up to take parcels with him. This information is especially useful when configuring SAMEDAY deliveries as it is crucial to have finished any fulfillment process until the arrival of the carrier.
deliveryAreas
This optional value might be of special interest to Custom Carriers and specific SAMEDAY carriers. It shows which target addresses (identified by an array of ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 conform country codes and their respective postalcodes) can be a valid target to a parcel sent via this carrier from the facility.
As long as the Carrier and the FacilityCarrierConnection stays in status "ACTIVE", it is possible to create shipments and in the end also parcels using DHL as a CEP (see Create a shipment with parcels to track) originating from this facility.
A parcel is the digital representation of one physical parcel that is on its way to the consumer. A shipment is the bracket around all parcels sent within a process using the same carrier.
After a parcel was created in status OPEN,fulfillmenttools is automatically taking care of the actual creation of the parcel label. During the time it takes fulfillmenttools and the CEPs API to negotiate and create a parcel, the status of the parcel changes from OPEN via PROCESSING to finally DONE. The shipment also changes its status to CONFIRMED as soon as all created parcels of the shipment have reached the status DONE.
If a special service (e.g., a signature) is required, this can be configured either when creating the parcel or the order. Only services offered by the chosen carrier will be taken when creating a parcel. Providing a service for a carrier which does not offer that service will be ignored.
There are differences in regards to delivery days depending on the carrier. While carrier X only delivers from Mondays till Fridays, carrier Y also operates on Saturdays. In addition, deliveries are usually not made on public holidays. Public holidays again vary from country to country and province to province. To store this information on the platform, it is possible to set up “non-delivery-days” in the respective carrier configurations. The stored information is then taken into account when calculating delivery times and possible delivery days.
Non delivery days can be either specific calendar dates (i.e. 01st January 2025) or weekdays (i.e. SUNDAY). While weekdays are always recurring (recurringNonDeliveryWeekdays), a specific calendar date can be set up as RECURRING or SINGLE by using the nonDeliveryType.
The carrier capacity feature allows managing and allocating carrier capacity at a granular level for a facility and its carrier pickup time. This ensures that carriers’ truck loading constraints are respected while routing orders.
Setting Carrier Capacities
In order to use this feature carrier capacities must be defined at the facility-carrier connection level. Thereby capacities are tied to specific cutoff times and represent the maximum number of parcels (1 task = 1 parcel) a truck can carry during a pickup. If no capacities are set the system uses infinite capacity as a default.
Users can configure multiple cutoff times per weekday for each facility-carrier connection, and exceptions can also be defined, such as days with no cutoff times or days with altered pickup schedules.
Capacity Allocation and Management
During order routing, the system checks for the next available capacity slot. Thereby (if activated) the facility capacity and it's fulfillmentbuffer is taken into consideration during the calculation as well as previous set carrier selection. Hereby a locked order also book capacity slots.
This procedure directly influences the target time as well as the LPS calculation.
Capacity Release on Cancellation or Rerouting
There are some cases where the initial capacity-booking must be reverted or adjusted. When cancelling an order the booked capacity slot is released.
When rerouting an order the slot is released for the initial facility-carrier connection and a new slot is booked for the newly selected facility-carrier connection.
In case an ordersplit after shortpick was performed we do not release the booked capacity in the facility where the initial pick was performed (since here items will be shipped). In addition a book another slot in the facility to which the missing items were rerouted.
