C.H. Robinson touts its progress on eBOL adoption by LTL carriers and shippers

Earlier today, Minneapolis, Minn.-based global third-party logistics (3PL) services provider and freight forwarder C.H. Robinson touted the benefits it is seeing as the first 3PL to adopt a new electronic bill of lading (eBOL), with 10 LTL (less-than-truckload) carriers and another four currently in the works.

What’s more, the company added that over the past year, 17,240 of its customers have leveraged the eBOL, with the expectation that the tally will increase in 2024.

The eBOL standard was developed by the National Motor Freight Traffic Association’s (NMFTA) Digital LTL Council and is part of what the Digital LTL Council calls its “crucial efforts to advance digitization of the industry in order to improve supply chain efficiency.” As previously reported by LM, this standard was issued in October 2022 and the NMFTA’s Digital LTL Council called for industry-wide implementation by July 2023.  

A key driver for the eBOL was for leading LTL carriers to adopt a single standard to replace the multitude of conflicting and confusing digital platforms that shippers, carriers and 3PLs have used—and complained about—for decades. The LTL industry long has been accused of lagging behind other modes of freight transport in adoption of digital technology. This was viewed as a move to try and eliminate that stigma.

“While there are fewer carriers in the LTL universe and the top 25 handle over 90% of the market, the complexity of moving LTL freight means that digitization in this part of the logistics industry has been more challenging than truckload,” said Greg West, Vice President for LTL at C.H. Robinson, in a statement. “With truckload freight, there’s generally one origin and one destination and a customer has exclusive use of the trailer.  With LTL, you can have up to 30 customers’ freight on a trailer, with 30 destinations and 30 sets of paperwork. That makes it so valuable to have a common eBOL everyone can use.”  

C.H. Robinson explained how using the eBOL standard has significantly improved operational processes for LTL carriers.

In the past, going back decades, it said that LTL bills of lading were handled by a carrier generating a tracking number for each shipper’s freight and then printing out stickers with those numbers. The next step required a driver take the stickers to a shipper’s loading dock, affixing them to a paper bill of lading and to each pallet, and then repeating that process at the next pickup. And it added that when the driver went to the carrier’s terminal at the end of the day, the tracking numbers from all the bills of lading would then be manually entered into the carrier’s computer system and sent to the logistics provider overnight or next day. And when the truck was already in transit, was the earliest point in which shippers start getting any visibility into their freight.  

The company highlighted how utilizing the eBOL has augmented this process in various ways, including:

• a tracking number being implemented within seconds of the shipment being tendered to the LTL carrier via API, with a complete bill of lading ready for the shipper when the driver arrives, with the driver needing to just scan the bill of lading;
• removing manual work, lowering administrative costs, reducing errors, and increasing efficiency at shippers’ docks; and
• with a tracking number known in advance, it said shippers are able to gain true real-time visibility, beginning with C.H. Robinson’s Navisphere platform when freight is picked up

In an interview with LM, C.H. Robinson’s West, whom also serves as a board member on the NMFTA’s Digital LTL Council, said C.H. Robinson is in the process of implementing the eBOL with four more carriers right now and in talks with others.

“The universe of LTL carriers is fairly small—about 120—compared to hundreds of thousands of truckload carriers,” he said. “But each individual carrier has to agree to adopt the standards, be able to use API and be willing to build out the specs in their technology to connect with ours. The good news is that each implementation goes a little smoother and a little faster, because of what we’ve learned along the way.”

When asked if there a “sweet spot,” of sorts, for the types of shippers implementing the eBOL, in terms of things like verticals and volumes, West explained that retailers and manufacturers, especially manufacturers in the automotive sector, are some of the heaviest users of LTL and are among the biggest beneficiaries of eBOL, simply because of scale.

“Think about the small shipments of many different products that have to get delivered across a retail chain or the shipments of parts and accessories across many car dealerships,” he said. “But really any LTL shipper can benefit from eBOL. Any time they can save at the dock, any errors they can avoid by information not being manually entered into a computer and any in-transit hiccups we can resolve for them because of earlier real-time visibility—it all adds up.”  

As for the costs savings seen by shippers working with carriers using the eBOL, West observed that like with other processes that are digitized, administrative costs are cut down when you have fewer keystrokes in the back office, more accurate billing, and less time on the phone tracking down information or resolving discrepancies.

“And then you have the savings that come from earlier and better real-time visibility,” he noted. “For C.H. Robinson customers, advanced visibility combined with proactively managing in-transit disruptions can save 10% of a shipper’s annual costs.”

Paul Dugent, Executive Director of NMFTA’s Digital LTL Council, said in a statement that C.H. Robinson's adoption of the electronic bill of lading (eBOL) stands as a landmark achievement in the digitization of the industry, adding that the company’s pioneering collaboration with leading LTL carriers and embrace of the Council’s standards showcase a firm commitment to modernizing logistics for enhanced efficiency and real-time visibility.

“This visionary approach will undoubtedly serve as a catalyst for broader industry adoption, ultimately benefiting both shippers and carriers alike,” said Dugent.