Exception management: An important aspect of supply chain visibility

Exception management is an effective mechanism in supply chain management and freight forwarding. The capability to address the issues and ensure the smooth functioning of the operations helps a company to be stable and with technology raising its bar every day in supply chain management, it’s more like management by exception rather than exception management. 

From exception, management to managing by exception

With supply chain visibility, customers can easily know the location of the cargo movement and get full access to information on every factor of the supply chain process, improving process efficiencies. This notification part creates the basis for managing by exception where all the events are notified as and when it occurs or are about to occur. In this way, one can improve planning by taking the right business decisions and mitigating risks across the entire supply chain. 

A reputed organisation’s study says that 71% of global CIOs believe the primary function of their supply chain by 2020 will be more customer service driven, so the ability to better manage exceptions becomes extremely essential for every company.

Managing by exception is nothing but data management challenges. The need for accurate information and up-to-date data for all the stakeholders and to manage the documents that are being exchanged to help resolve issues and queries in a quick manner. 

An innovative platform for management by exception should include:

Business process enforcement
The platform must identify the business logic and capture the business rules that are envisaged to handle exceptions. The exception rules must adhere to and support the company’s policies and procedures as well as it should be in line with individual partners and trading partner groups. 

Validating the transaction 
The smart platform should allow validating the data at each level against pre-defined rules of the business. All the inbound and outbound digitised transactions should be validated against the prescribed rules, identifying errors and issues and drilling down to root-cause data. 

Alerts & notifications
Exception management capabilities should not only include real-time email alerts or to inform whenever problems occur, but should also support complicated exception management processes, such as the generation of production issues or a delay in shipment. This will help customers to take timely decisions and actions for their businesses.

Online reporting and analysis
The online reports can be easily generated to provide visibility and to analyse the key metrics. Reports can be customised, downloaded, analysed, and drilled to details to share with the respective stakeholders. 
20Cube Logistics’s smart portal MyHubPlus offers visibility of the cargo movement with a pro-active exception management mechanism. It captures real-time information and provides information via email alerts and web API, even when not logged in to the platform. This feature is one-step ahead and allows customers to make informed decisions to help their business thrive.