About Lafarge Canada

Lafarge Canada is one of the largest diversified supplier of construction materials in Canada. Lafarge produces and sells cement, concrete and aggregates. Lafarge Aggregates supplies products for asphalt paving, and construction, precast solutions and pipe products. Octacom was pleased to work with Lafarge on a better solution for management of their delivery tickets for proof of delivery.

The challenge: half a million delivery tickets a year

Sheer volume and a very manual process created an environment where tickets were difficult to manage. Lafarge Aggregates creates about a half million delivery tickets per year for their Greater Toronto plants.

The nature of their business requires drivers to obtain a signature with each delivery of product which then becomes the basis for their customer billings. Head office has the difficult task of ensuring all signed delivery tickets are received and easily accessible should they be required for proof of delivery purposes.

Timely retrieval of signed ticket copies and visibility into the whereabouts of lost or misplaced tickets was becoming more and more challenging for Lafarge creating additional labour for head office and unnecessary loss of revenue.

The solution: document imaging and Odiss™ for proof of delivery

Octacom was selected by Lafarge as their partner providing document imaging services and its Odiss™ software for Proof of Delivery Management, creating a cost-effective, efficient and secure solution for Lafarge.

Document imaging services

Each day, signed delivery tickets are sent to one of Octacom’s production facilities to be digitized and indexed by a combination of automated capture technologies, manual data entry and data file validation.

Odiss™ document management software

• The imaged documents are uploaded to Odiss™, which are accessed by Lafarge users for retrieval of signed delivery tickets.

• Integration of Lafarge ERP data enables daily dashboard reporting providing instant information about missing tickets and the ability for Lafarge to identify and notify drivers that have neglected to submit tickets as proof of delivery.

The process: from signed ticket to searchable record

Source: A POD is generated at source then is transferred into SAP. This POD goes with the delivery vehicle to the delivery location.

Delivery Location: Once the delivery has been made, the recipient signs the physical or digital POD, at which point the driver can upload it directly to Odiss™ or delivers the POD to the production unit to be couriered to Octacom, to then be imaged and indexed.

Document Management: Within Odiss™, all tickets are searchable and accessible by finance and operations, minimizing time spent providing back up for accounts receivable and audits. Additionally, Odiss™ provides a business intelligence dashboard demonstrating tickets outstanding vs. tickets received over time, and drivers/production units that are not compliant.

The results: full visibility and fewer missing tickets

With robust reporting and analytics, Lafarge now have a complete visibility that allows them to track, retrieve, monitor and report on all proof of delivery and ticket events.

Through text message, Lafarge can notify drivers of missing tickets and provide a secure link, where drivers can upload directly through the Odiss™ portal.

Managing hundreds of thousands of deliveries is no easy task but with the help of the Octacom Odiss™ solution for Proof of Delivery documents, Lafarge have been able to realize significant cost savings through reduced manual hours at the plants and head office and elimination of lost revenue and reduce days outstanding on invoice payments.