Informational
Benton Express, founded in 1934, provides a load-direct shipping service for quality-conscious customers in five southeastern US states. Working out of twenty-four terminals, Benton’s 638 partners (employees) ship freight directly to its destination overnight.
Eliminating breakbulk terminals enables Benton to achieve high on-time service percentages and a low claims ratio.
Benton charges by the hundredweight (kilogramme). Customer-provided weight statements were used for billing until new Avery Weigh-Tronix Forklift Truck Scales arrived.
The Old System
The weight of each shipment was documented for billing using the weight statement provided by the customer. Shipment weight was not checked, because the time and inconvenience of traveling to and from the floor scale with each load, and unloading/re-loading it would eliminate any savings realized by correcting erroneous weight statements.
Developing The Solution
Clete Cordero, a Project Manager at Benton, believed that weight verification would provide a significant increase in revenue. According to Mr. Cordero, “We needed a system that provided instant legal-for-trade weighment of each load without adding steps to our normal procedures.”
After reading about Avery Weigh-Tronix Forklift Truck Scales, Mr. Cordero consulted his local representative regarding Benton’s procedures and weight verification goals.
The representative recommended Avery Weigh-Tronix legal-for-trade Forklift Truck Scales and offered to provide one for a 30-day free-of-charge trial period. When the scale was delivered, Mr. Cordero asked the appropriate partners to implement it as soon as possible.
The cab-mounted indicators display operator prompts simultaneously with weight data to provide intuitive ease-of-use. This feature allowed the partners to implement their trial-use Forklift Truck Scale immediately, with no training.
The additional revenue collected during that 30-day trial period proved that the scales would be a profitable investment for Benton Express.
The Payoff
The instant legal-for-trade weighment of each load, provided by the Avery Weigh-Tronix Forklift Truck Scales, enables Benton Express to collect an additional 1.5% revenue per month. For most Benton terminals, a scale pays for itself during the first 30 days of use and every dollar collected after that is pure profit. The company is currently in the process of outfitting all terminals with Avery Weigh-Tronix legal-for-trade Forklift Truck Scales.
In addition to ensuring accurate billing, the scales’ accurate weight verification enables dock workers to load the trucks evenly and legally, which avoids overload fines, excessive wear on the vehicle, and unsafe operation.
Services
Bench Scales – Checkweighers – Counting Scales – Forklift Truck Scales – Load Cells / Weigh Bar – Mobile Dimensioning – Platform / Floor Scales –
Post, Mail & Shipping Scales – Rail Scales – Software Solutions – Truck Scales – Weight Indicators
Industries Covered
Chemical & Petrochemical – Construction – Food & Beverage – Manufacturing – Mining & Aggregates – Transport & Logistics – Waste & Recycling- Other Industries
Source: Avery
