Get online or face a struggle, operators told
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• Once again hauliers have been warned to embrace e-commerce or face being sidelined by their more forward-thinking competitors.
Speaking at the e-freight conference in Brussels last week, Cap Gemini consultant Erik Van fort said: "More and more product is going to be traded on the Web. "Are you going to wait to be asked whether you can do business this way? Twenty percent of shipping and warehousing will be arranged online by 2904."
Van fort added that hauliers did not necessarily need a complicated site. It is better to get online with something simple than not at all," he emphasised to delegates. Roger Morley, strategy developer for Union Pacific Technologies, said the Internet was a good way of cutting costs, adding: You can stop calls to a customer centre by making people use the Internet to track the product. It is also a good source of information for employees."
However, he warned against potential pitfalls of having a site that was under-developed, citing potential problems with a site's performance, security and availability.
Last February members of the reefer organisation Transfrigoroute were urged to get online and learn about the Internet to avoid becoming losers in the new technology stakes.