Eliminating Mispulls with Doran's Automated Trailer Verification Widget

In hard economic times and tight budgets, fleets are looking for every opportunity to reduce waste and improve efficiencies. A most basic but imperative area for operational efficiency is trailer verification — that is, ensuring the right trailer is pulled every time. 

While it sounds like a simple task, many factors can impact the ability to ensure drivers have the right trailer for each load. From congested yards to hard-to-find trailers, long wait times for loads/unloads, and long ID numbers that can be easily mixed up, drivers waste valuable time and risk major fallout if they don’t notice when the wrong trailer is pulled. 

For drivers, pulling the wrong trailer can bring consequences ranging from a stern talking-to to termination. For fleets, the “small” problem of pulling the wrong trailer can have a large ripple effect that includes:

• Missed deadlines and delivery expectations, with potential late delivery fees
• Ruined products or loads, especially with time-sensitive deliveries
• Compliance violations, in the case of hazardous materials
• Cross contamination of loads leading to increased expenses and loss
• Hours of wasted time for yard employees, back office, and drivers
• Fuel wastage to reroute the swapped trailers
• Damage to company reputation and customer expectations

Drivers and fleets have engineered various processes and procedures to ensure the right trailer is attached to the right cab. Many are manual efforts that leave room for human error, typos, misreads, and mixed up paperwork, and add the stress of checking and rechecking your load ID multiple times before leaving the yard.

Doran Manufacturing recently launched a new tool for Platform Science customers that takes the guesswork and headache out of ensuring you’re pulling the correct trailer every time with the Doran Trailer SmartLink. Trailer SmartLink utilizes RF communication to identify which trailer is currently connected and alerts the driver on the Platform Science tablet, simultaneously providing the trailer ID# to Platform Science workflow for increased visibility and verification.

The Trailer SmartLink solution delivers trailer ID# directly to a widget on the driver’s tablet. This allows the driver and back office to Identify trailer assignment errors in real time, avoiding unplanned costs and unexpected delays from trailer mispulls. It increases driver efficiency by reducing the manual checking of trailer loads and ID numbers and the headache of hard copy tracking.

The Doran Trailer SmartLink feature represents the ongoing efforts of Doran and Platform Science to drive down fleet costs while improving efficiencies through innovative technologies.

‍Contact us today to learn more about the Doran Trailer SmartLink or check out Platform Science’s full suite of tools for fleets now.