If you work in the haulage industry in any capacity you probably know how important it is to keep up to date with the latest technology, regulations and more. Filling transport contracts is competitive, high pressure work, and it’s crucial businesses can be flexible, efficient and reliable.
With this being the case, everyone in the transport sector has good reasons to turn to any means available to grow their business. And Haulage Exchange (HX) is one of the very best. Read on to learn how the popular freight exchange network can benefit you.
What is Haulage Exchange?
HX is the UK’s fastest growing freight exchange network, providing a platform for clients to post transport contracts and owner drivers or firms to complete them.
General Benefits
HX’s core service is its easy and efficient bookings platform. Posting and looking for jobs on the network can help you in the following ways:
•Providing fast and flexible access to available jobs in real time
•Automatically updating job-in-progress data
•Working out and generating estimated costs and invoices.
In addition, HX also works with businesses in the transport sector to get great deals and discounts for its members.
Increased Efficiency
One of the biggest concerns for anyone working on transport contracts is keeping costs as low as possible. The high level of competition in the haulage sector means margins can often be tight, and even small savings can make the difference between sinking and swimming.
Luckily, access to a large and regularly updated freight exchange network allows haulage companies to maximise the profit they can make from every journey.
How? It’s simple: just search for any available work at an existing job’s point of delivery to turn an unladen return journey into a paid trip. (Aka a return load.) Not only can you make money you otherwise wouldn’t, you get to offset any costs you’d incur paying for fuel or driver hours and clients get their jobs completed. It’s win-win!
Keeping Up with Technological Change
Many firms in the haulage sector, especially smaller ones, have long histories and established traditions. Milford-based family firm H. Nickolls and Sons Ltd, for instance, has almost a century of history, dating back to managing director John Nickolls’ grandfather.
John learnt his trade practically, taking lessons from his father and grandfather from an early age. He’s rightly proud of his ability to be flexible, especially his willingness to get behind the wheel and complete urgent transport contracts himself in a pinch.
But Nickolls and Sons was at risk of relying too heavily on outdated methods, until John recognised that changing technologies have revolutionised the industry – particularly in communications. While John deserves the lion’s share of the credit for his firm’s successful and ongoing adaptation to using modern telematics, his membership of HX has been crucial in the company’s ability to make best use of modern digital tools.
Expand Without Investing
Along with the example above, HX membership also allows companies to expand their fleets without needing to invest in new vehicles or drivers. Sharing and bidding for transport contracts through the exchange allows creative and flexible managers to subcontract work to a ‘virtual’ fleet. With over 50,000 hauliers ready to take on work, it’s easy to find a way to satisfy every potential client’s needs.
This is again a win-win: the client gets a job completed, and the delivery firm gets an even better reputation for reliably meeting client needs. It’s also a great way of expanding a firm’s reach, by taking on work that previously they may not have had capacity for.
There are plenty of reasons to turn to HX to improve your business and ongoing changes and advances will only make membership more appealing.
Norman Dulwich is a Correspondent for Haulage Exchange, the leading online trade network for the road transport industry. Connecting logistics professionals across the UK and Europe through their website, Haulage Exchange provides services for matching haulage contracts with available drivers, and is now the fastest growing Freight Exchange in the UK.
This article is copyright free.