eTransfers, a new feature within Emydex’s Warehouse Management module is a new development that gives food processing plants total control over stock transfers between sites, whether inter-company or 3rd party sites such as Cold Storage facilities.
The business benefits of eTransfers include near real-time communications, guaranteed delivery, and box level traceability of stocks once put-away in 3rd party locations, a feature most legacy WMS systems are incapable of delivering.
eTransfers uses email as its transport mechanism. Once received, emails are logged into the recipient Emydex system automatically for processing. “We chose to use email for three reasons” said James Grennan, Technical Director with Emydex “first, email is freely available to everyone – everyone has email. Second, email guarantees delivery in that if the recipient is offline, the email exchange will buffer the message and keep trying to resend until the message is finally delivered. Third, email offers single to multiple-point communications capabilities. One email message can be sent once to multiple locations or parties simultaneously” he added. This all means there is a lesser chance of failure to deliver electronic messages than when using other transport mechanisms.
All messages to be exported and imported between Emydex systems are in the form of structured XML using standard messaging protocols. The types of electronic messages transferred between sites includes Advanced Shipping Notices (ASNs), Shipment Receipt Notices, Shipment Dispatch Requests/Notices, Inventory Level Requests/Notices, Shipment Status Requests/Notices and Inventory Update Notices. A shipment Dispatch Notice for example contains details such as shipment date, time, no pallets, no boxes etc.
This is Emydex’s version of EDI, only better, using which customers can exchange data with 3rd party systems in a standard secure and reliable way. Messages can be encrypted and compressed if required.
The new eTransfers system was successfully in the lead up to Christmas with Moy Park Poultry in Ballymena, and the Interfrigo Cold Storage facility in Antrim, both Emydex customers. In the few weeks before Christmas an enormous volume of Turkeys were shipped out by Moy Park many of which were bound for Interfrigo. Using the eTransfers feature Moy Park are able to dispatch and trace shipments into and out of Interfrigo seamlessly. On the Interfrigo side, once received, goods were verified, put-away picked and dispatched all via Emydex, with the ability to break-down and rebuild pallets to fulfil sales orders as required. The Interfrigo Emydex system also includes a web-portal to allow customers real-time access to their stocks within Interfrigo.
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