Hobbs Global Logistics Solutions Ltd is an established Global Supply Chain Management Company with an enviable reputation for personalized service through senior staff with a depth of experience.
Brief
Hobbs approached Amaze with the idea of creating an online freight calculator for their clients.
Providing quotes online through a dedicated calculator would remove the need for clients to call Hobbs over the phone to get a quote.
Clients of Hobbs were also eager to have an online solution as this would allow them to retrieve quotes faster, on-demand and allow them greater flexibility in exploring their various shipment options.
Key requirements for the freight calculator were:
- Clients to have separate logins and trade lanes personalised to their needs
- Quotes to be calculated on demand with a full breakdown of costs
- Support for FCL (Full Container Load) & LCL (Less-than Container Load) shipping
- Ability to apply charges separately to different trade lanes
- Ability to administer all aspects of the calculator (trade lanes, types of shipments, charges, associated costs and clients)
Solution
Amaze built a custom web application for Hobbs that has provided their clients with a simple, quick, solution to retrieve a quote.
The solution has reduced the time Hobbs spend on the phone with clients and has resulted in clients requesting more quotes, due to the speed and the ease that they can now retrieve them.
Hobbs have the ability to add new clients to the freight calculator on the fly and remove old clients who should no longer have access.
The system is extremely customisable, allowing Hobbs to manage trade lanes and all the individual charges for specific trade lanes, which make up a quote.
Hobbs have rolled the system out to a number of their biggest clients and have plans to further expand its usage and the overall role it plays within the business.
Plans for version 2 of the freight calculator are already underway, with the introduction of airfreight and a mobile version being discussed, as Hobbs looks to further incorporate the tool into the core of their business.
Amaze built the freight calculator using the Ruby on Rails web development framework.
Ruby on Rails provides a structured development framework that makes it simpler to produce a solution that’s flexible, which makes it easier to build future feature requests at minimal cost to the client.
