Logistics / Port Operations
Transport Management System for Port Logistics & Cartage
A custom transport management system for port cartage and warehousing, deployed across four major sea ports: container tracking, vessel schedule integration, and automated billing on one platform.
- Role
- Business analysis, architecture, development, QA, and long-term support
- Xero
- OCR document capture
- Carrier EDI and XML feeds
- Container exchange integration
- iOS and Android field apps
The challenge
What the business was running into
- Four major sea ports were running on a mix of legacy systems, spreadsheets, and manual coordination, with no single source of truth for operational data
- Container tracking was fragmented, billing was done by hand and prone to error, and vessel scheduling wasn't integrated with warehouse operations
- Charges arrive from every direction in port cartage, including port fees, demurrage, tolls, quarantine inspection, storage, and futile jobs, and each was being calculated and chased manually
- Growing transaction volumes amplified the cost of every gap between disconnected systems, driving errors and delays at scale
The approach
Port cartage and warehousing operate under conditions most transport software never accounts for. Vessel schedules shift by the hour. Containers pass through several custodians before delivery. Quarantine and compliance obligations attach at each step. And the charges are relentless, arriving as port fees, demurrage, tolls, storage, inspection, dehire, and futile jobs, each with its own rules and its own argument attached. Off-the-shelf transport management systems flatten that reality into generic fields. This operator, running cartage and warehousing across four major sea ports, had outgrown exactly that kind of tooling and was holding operations together with legacy systems, spreadsheets, and phone calls between terminals.
We built the system around how port logistics actually runs, starting with requirements gathering and a gap analysis against the software already in place. Vessel arrival data flows into yard and warehouse planning. Containers and vehicles are tracked in real time from berth to final delivery. A dispatch scheduler shows which drivers and vehicles are genuinely available for a window and allocates work against them. Drivers and yard managers work from mobile apps connected to the same live platform the office uses, and clients check shipment status and charges through their own portal instead of calling in.
The billing engine is where the operational detail concentrated. Eleven distinct charge categories are modeled with their own rules, so an invoice is produced from what actually happened on the job rather than reconstructed from memory a week later. Invoices and payments pass into the finance system directly. Around that, we closed the gaps where data used to be retyped: optical character recognition lifts details off inbound paperwork, and structured feeds from carriers and container exchange platforms keep arrivals, releases, and empty container movements current on their own.
The system went live across all four ports and was engineered to scale nationally from the start. Years on, it runs the daily operation without a dedicated maintenance budget. That is the outcome we design every system for.
Key capabilities
What the system does
Container and vehicle tracking
Real-time visibility into container status and vehicle location across all four port facilities, from vessel arrival through final delivery, without manual status checks.
Dispatch scheduler
A scheduling workbench that shows which drivers and vehicles are actually free for a given window and allocates jobs against them, replacing the whiteboard and the phone calls it depended on.
Billing engine across every charge type
Eleven categories of charge modeled with their own rules, covering transportation, port fees, demurrage, storage, tolls, quarantine inspection, unpack and pack, dehire, futile jobs, surcharges, and general fees. Invoices are generated from the operational record rather than reconstructed after the fact.
Accounting integration
Invoices and payments flow directly into the finance system, so billing raised in operations does not have to be retyped by the accounts team.
Document capture
Optical character recognition pulls data off inbound paperwork and into the system, removing a step that previously meant reading a document and typing what it said.
Carrier and container data feeds
Structured feeds from carriers and container exchange platforms keep arrivals, releases, and empty container movements current without anyone rekeying them.
Mobile field apps
Driver and yard manager applications extend real-time operational data to the field, keeping every team member connected to the same live platform.
Customer portal
Direct client self-service for shipment visibility and charge review, reducing inbound support queries while giving clients the transparency they expect.
Costing and reporting
Job costing that accounts for fuel and driver time, with operational reports and scheduled email alerts for jobs missing a delivery date.
Outcome
Four ports run on a single operational platform with real-time container visibility, automated billing across eleven charge types, and mobile apps carrying live data to drivers and yard staff.
Results
What changed for the business
Eliminated siloed coordination
Four previously disconnected ports now share one operational data layer, eliminating the coordination overhead that had accumulated between systems for years.
Reduced billing errors
Automated rate calculations and invoice generation drove billing error rates toward zero across all port operations.
Real-time multi-port visibility
Management gained live insight across all four ports simultaneously. For the first time, decisions could be made on current data rather than delayed reports.
Rekeying removed from the workflow
Document capture, carrier feeds, and the accounting integration together removed the manual re-entry that sat between every pair of systems.
Related Services
Custom Software Development
Purpose-built systems that replace manual work and outgrown software. Designed, built, and supported by the same senior team.
Mobile App Development
iOS and Android apps for the people doing the work, in the field, on the floor, or at the counter.
DevOps
Release pipelines, infrastructure as code, and monitoring, so shipping stops being an event.