OREANDA-NEWS. NFT, the UK's leading chilled food and drink distributor, has deployed an innovative new system for proof of delivery (POD) which will provide greater visibility and transparency across the entire logistics supply chain. Developed and installed by e-docs UK, the solution is based around the award-winning enterprise capture solution ABBYY FlexiCapture. The e-docs UK solution efficiently handles over 100,000 PODs every week with a web-based, query management system that enables customers to rapidly identify and resolve any discrepancies on a timely basis.

According to Andrew De Vere, NFT’s Director of Warehouse Operations with responsibility for Customer Services: “We are committed to developing our infrastructure to increase operational efficiency and achieve optimum satisfaction levels. The e-docs UK system meets the needs of food and drink manufacturers for rapid and timely access to delivery documents and enables our customer services team to be more productive looking after customers rather than spending their time trying to track down paperwork.”

The new system enables all supplier PODs and retailer goods receipt notes to be scanned and then sent to ABBYY FlexiCapture where the documents are read, and meta data is automatically extracted for indexing using multiple criteria including supplier name, PO number, delivery date and delivery point. With this information the search and retrieval processes are significantly improved. Additionally, over 85% of the documents uploaded to the e-docs UK OneView server can be viewed the same day, a powerful benefit to NFT. NFT customers, such as Tesco, ASDA, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons now have direct access to all delivery documentation enabling them to rapidly locate and resolve discrepancies and keep on top of supermarket returns.

“We would not have been able to deliver this solution within budget with any other capture product on the market than ABBYY FlexiCapture,” says Colin Baterip, managing director of e-docs UK. “On an annual basis we have saved over ?100,000 in production costs thanks to a variety of features in FlexiCapture: the flexible document definitions, an unrivalled indexing and validation ability, and the significantly reduced time for preparation and scanning were all huge wins for us. Those features, coupled with a very competitive licensing cost, made our decision easy and we plan to use ABBYY FlexiCapture for input management in the future.”

NFT’s new web-based query management system enables customers to log and monitor queries and related responses, with every request being automatically allocated to an advisor for action. The system also has a powerful reporting capability that allows NFT to effectively measure and manage the performance of the customer services team to ensure that targets for improving service levels and customer satisfaction are met.

e-docs UK worked closely in partnership with NFT’s customer services team throughout the deployment process to clean up existing data and streamline processes in readiness for the new system. The company is now enhancing the system to provide more reporting and traceability. Additional search filters will provide third party logistics suppliers, working on behalf of NFT, with the same level of access to all their delivery documentation.