Friday, January 20. 2012
The hospitality industry
-Your receiving area as a profit center-some helpful tips-Part 2
A complete chain of custody
of a guest's package from reception in your receiving area to their
room with a captured signature provides peace of mind for everyone
involved particularly, the guest. How will you offer the same peace
of mind for packages sent out by the guest or group? Reverse package
tracking with delivery management.
You can provide outbound
package tracking with the same software solution and increase
profits. The delivery management software will allow for the creation
of a bar code label for the package. The pick up person can scan in
the bar code and also take a photo to capture the image for the
guest. The package can then be processed by the shipping/receiving
department and require that the carrier (UPS/FedEx) representative
sign for the item, completing the chain of custody. From guest pick
up to carrier signature; the package is trackable. The package can be
searched in all of the many ways any package can be searched, guest
name, tracking number, carrier, date, notes, location, etc. This
information can be searched by any of the property staff who have
authorization for the package tracking software.
In addition, an outbound
shipping module can be added to efficiently process the outbound
packages for any carrier, determined by the guest or the property.
This system will rate shop, add handling charges and track the
packages. It is an effective way to add income, improve the guest
experience and provide an end to end solution.
Find out more about package tracking, delivery management and proof of delivery at SQBX.com.
Tuesday, January 17. 2012
The hospitality industry -Your receiving area as a profit center - some helpful tips -Part 1 Many properties have a small handling charge for receiving and delivering packages for guests. Managing these charges can be challenging, time consuming and possibly a point of contention with the guest. The income potential is significant and should not be discounted because of these concerns. Best methods would include acquiring a software solution for tracking packages that minimizes these issues and understanding the best ways to reduce the time spent on tracking guest packages based on your property's package tracking and package delivering procedures. A package tracking software program will pay for itself if it will: billing detail for the guest by package with time, date, received by, etc. Other solution suggestions include ensuring that the software is simple and easy to use as well as simple and flexible to adapt to your property and changing procedures. Plenty of meaningful reports is also a recommendation. be sure to try out the system live to better understand its capabilities, features and ease of use. State of the art systems now utilize robust handheld devices that will capture signatures as well as photos (of damaged or mystery packages). They are easy to use, very reliable and will hold up after being dropped or with other minor abuse. Maintenance should include software and hardware coverage. The ability to receive or deliver or receive and deliver without returning to the dock or receiving area will save a lot of time and better serve everyone. Newer technology will also be completely web based, (cloud based is the best) eliminating the need for any software to be loaded on the properties network while requiring zero IT department involvement for the installation or after the sale support. A faster, smoother installation will result and the support will be of the instant chat variety vs. waiting for an day or more for a local repairman. Since, the income and savings form the system will accrue monthly; a monthly lease will better serve cash flow than an outright purchase and eliminate annual maintenance increases. Will your property also produce income and increase guest service with an outbound shipping system for shipping packages out for your guests? Now is a good time to explore this income source utilized by many well managed hotels and resorts. Part two discusses how to take advantage of this frequently overlooked potential. Find out more about how package tracking for inbound items can work for you at www.SQBXcloud.com.
Monday, January 16. 2012
It's a the dirty little secret that UPS and FedEx don't want you to know about.....or is it? Did you know that you can achieve next day delivery by using UPS or FedEx Ground? Yup that's right! In many cases a ground package will get to its destination in one day GUARANTEED. In fact by using the ground delivery map you'll notice that ground packages can get to their destination for the most part between 1 and 5 days. This is very useful knowledge whan comparing next day air, second day air, and three day shipments to ground shipping. By doing so you can save several dollars on overnight and second day air packages. 
Typically warehouses are in the know about this. But you shouldn't leave this to the warehouse to make the decision. These rules should be built into your busines systems. For example, our solutions automatically rate shop and provide a list of carrier services that will meet a specified delivery date.
Perhaps the biggest offender of overspending on shipping is the office worker unfamilar with delivery comparison. Giving office workers the capability to prepare shipments from their desktop is a license to spend money. So if you're going to do this, ensure that business rules are enforced through your business systems. Most carrier provided systems don't offer this level of control. Ensure your range of shippers from office staff to warehouse operators use systems with business controls built in.
Get you ground delivery maps here:
http://www.fedex.com/grd/maps/ShowMapEntry.do
http://www.ups.com/maps
Friday, January 13. 2012
 What happens when a package comes into your organization that is clearly damaged. Do you accept it, refuse delivery, notify the recipient of the condition or just proceed with your normal receiving process as if nothing were wrong? It is important to log the condition of damaged package as soon as possible, so that there is no confusion as to who was responsible for the damage. One way of documenting the damage is to create a written note that travels with the package to illustrate that the package was received in this state. Another more effective way is to photograph the package, so that the recipient can actually see what has happened to their item. These processes can be automated through the use of a package tracking system that has digital photo taking capability. Here is how the process should go. The damaged package is received by the clerk with a mobile handheld scanner, a photo is taken on the handheld and a quick note is keyed into the device outlining the condition of the package. Next, an email notification is sent directly to the recipient stating that they had received a package and it is in a damaged state. This entire process will take only seconds to complete through SQBX our inbound package tracking system and will remove the liability from the receiver. Parcel tracking systems like SQBX will give you greater control of your mail and receiving centers and provide a greater visibility for your recipients that are expecting packages.
To learn more about how SQBX can assist you in the receiving and documenting of damaged packages please contact us.
Wednesday, January 11. 2012
The hospitality industry - Your receiving area as a profit center - some helpful tips -Part One. Many properties have a small handling charge for receiving and delivering packages for guests. Managing these charges can be challenging, time consuming and possibly a point of contention with the guest. The income potential is significant and should not be discounted because of these concerns. Best methods would include acquiring a software solution for tracking packages that minimizes these issues and understanding the best ways to reduce the time spent on tracking guest packages based on your property's package tracking and package delivering procedures. A package tracking software program will pay for itself if it will: billing detail for the guest by package with time, date, received by, etc. Other solution suggestions include ensuring that the software is simple and easy to use as well as simple and flexible to adapt to your property and changing procedures. Plenty of meaningful reports is also a recommendation. be sure to try out the system live to better understand its capabilities, features and ease of use. State of the art systems now utilize robust handheld devices that will capture signatures as well as photos (of damaged or mystery packages). They are easy to use, very reliable and will hold up after being dropped or with other minor abuse. Maintenance should include software and hardware coverage. The ability to receive or deliver returning to the dock or receiving area will save a lot of time and better serve everyone. Newer technology will also be completely web based (cloud based is the best), eliminating the need for any software to be loaded on the properties network while requiring very little to zero IT department involvement for the installation or after the sale support. A faster, smoother installation will result and the support will be of the instant chat variety vs. waiting for a day or more for a local repairman. Since, the income and savings form the system will accrue monthly; a monthly lease will better serve cash flow than an outright purchase and eliminate annual maintenance increases. Will your property also produce income and increase guest service with an outbound shipping system for shipping packages out for your guests? Now is a good time to explore this income source utilized by many well managed hotels and resorts. Part two discusses how to take advantage of this frequently overlooked potential. Find out more about how package tracking for inbound items can work for you at www.SQBXcloud.com.
Tuesday, January 10. 2012
If you're the type of company that ships mostly the same type of item or perhaps you have batches of shipment that are similar, a batch shipping module in your order fulfillment process might just be the ticket. Our objective is to process shipping labels for multiple, nay, hundreds of packages with a few clicks, than collect the labels from our printer and apply them to the packages. To determine routing and shipping rates, carriers are primarily concerned with four main factors ; delivery location, dimension, weight, and contents. So for batch shipment processing we need to ensure that the packaging and weight are all the same. The contents may be different as long as no special services need to applied to any particular package i.e declared value. It's ok to apply a special service to a batch process. Just remember that in the batch we assume all packages will get the same special service. For example, it's ok to ship 100 smart phones to 100 different customers and to add declared value (insurance) to each one for $200.00. That means that each package in this shipment have the same packaging, same weight, and same value. Some may have different versions of phones but it doesn't change the weight or value (for shipping purposes). Some systems can print separate packing slips and shipping labels. In many cases it's even more clever to have the packing slip and shipping label combined in one document. So a batch shipping process might flow like this in Zenventory: 100 customers order Samsung Galaxy S2 Cell Phones 1. Group the cell phone orders for picking and packing in Zenventory. 2. Print the picking slips. 3. Pick the phones into the boxes. 4. Pack verify the orders in Zenventory. 5. Group the packed orders for shipment processing in Zenventory. 6. Acknowledge the weight and special services. 7. Press ship and collect your combination packing slips/shipping labels. 8 Distribute them throughout the packages.
Friday, January 6. 2012
Over the past twelve months our development team has been
hard at work in labs designing the most comprehensive package tracking system
on the market. SQBX. Our web based
application has came leaps and bounds from its inception. We have bolted on a multi-carrier shipping
system, so that SQBX can now handle both inbound receiving as well as out bound
shipping. This is not the ordinary
multi-carrier shipping system that resides on a computer. This is an enterprise web based application
that can be accessed at the desk tops of unlimited amounts users. SQBX will provide the global visibility to
track and manage all shipments both inbound and outbound in addition to
enforcing your business rules to ensure the best possible rates are being
selected when a shipment is being generated by the casual shipper.
We have also be redeploying our inventory management
software Zenventory to the smaller business segments. Zenventory provides the robust features of an
enterprise inventory management solution at an affordable price for the small
business owners. For those that need an
enterprise system with shipping integration, we have that covered as well. Our shipping experts can work with your team
to establish business rules to minimize your shipping expenditures while
integrating every thing seamlessly through your inventory and purchase order
management system Zenventory. Give us a call today to learn more about the power of SQBX
and Zenventory.
Friday, July 1. 2011
This is an exciting month for the team here at SQBX. We will be attending the Nacums (national association for college and university mail services) conference in Nashville Tennessee from July 17-20th. Please feel free to visit our booth 13 on the trade show floor. We will be conducting live demonstrations of the our powerful web based package tracking solution SQBX. In addition to exhibiting, our chief systems architect will conducting an educational seminar discussing the benefits of cloud computing and how it relates to the university mail center. SQBX for those of you out there that are not familiar with our product is the world's first and fastest 100% cloud based package tracking solution. Being that the system resides on the cloud, there is minimal impact to your IT staff, but will provide you with the enterprise solution that can handle even the most demanding receiving environments. We pride ourselves on high level of service as well as staying ahead of the pack by constantly improving our solution. Inbound package tracking has never been easier, and your experience will never be better than when working with us here at SQBX. We look forward to seeing at the conference in July.
Friday, June 10. 2011
Ever wonder why it takes so long for your employees to complete a relatively simple task when they leave the building or facility? SQBX vehicle tracking is the answer. We are able to track and trace the status of your fleet of vehicles. By embedding a GPS device into the diagnostic port of your vehicle we will give you the eye in the sky to manage the activity of your drivers. We can create geo-fences against a map and alert you when your drivers are out of bounds. The powerful reporting engine can present data such as speed, ignition on or off, stop time, fuel consumption, RPM, hard break events, and point to point location. Increase driver safety and reduce expenses by monitoring the activities of your drivers when they are out of your sight. This system can by coupled with our package tracking solution in order to get a real time view of where a particular package is when it is in transit. Are your vehicles being used for the personal benefit of your employees outside of work responsibilities? Put an end to unauthorized use through the watchful eye of SQBX vehicle tracking software solution.
Friday, June 3. 2011
 Colleges as Universities are tasked with the job of handling, sorting, and storing packages for their student body and faculty. This can be a daunting task depending on the size of the school, mail room staff, and space available. SQBX is the ideal solution for college mail centers. Our system can quickly scan packages upon receipt from the carriers, locate the position or mailbox of the recipient from the database, inform the mail staff of any special instructions, notify the recipient of the package, and notate the storage location of that package. This will process can be done in a matter of seconds with the use of a hand held scanner or mobile computer coupled with the powerful think engine of SQBX. We have taken email notification to the next level. Our system can schedule notifications to be sent on a scheduled basis. For instance, SQBX will send a 1st notification upon receipt of the package, a second notification 2 days after the first notification, a 3rd notification 2 days after the 2nd and a final notification 2 days after the 3rd. These events or emails can be customized to meet the needs of the particular school. SQBX inbound package tracking system can even send these notification directly to the recipients cell phone via text message. This is an industry first. Please stay tuned to learn more about some of our innovations in the student mail center that have made SQBX the package tracking system of choice by many large and small learning institutions across the country.
Friday, May 20. 2011
Our developers here at Ubiquia have been hard at work designing the latest enhancement to our SQBX line of tracking solutions. We have created a true point to point tracking system for inter-office mail. Here is how it works. The originator can create a shipment directly from their desktop through our web based shipping portal. This will give the originator the option to rate shop the package to ensure the lowest possible rate to meet their delivery objective. Once the rate is selected, they can print a shipping label to affix to the package. At this time, a pick up request will be sent to the mailing staff that there is a pending shipment ready to be picked up. When the mail courier picks up the package from the originator or sender they will scan the package in as picked up and this is the beginning of the tracking process. If the package is traveling by common carrier like UPS or FedEx you will be able to see the shipment status directly in SQBX even though it is outside of the boundaries of your organization. Once the package lands at it's destination and scanned in as received, this status will be visible to both the recipient as well as the sender. The package will finally be delivered to the end recipient and signed for which is the final step in the tracking process. The system will provide complete visibility to both the recipient and the sender as to the current status of a particular package. Call today and request a live demonstration on our Point-to-Point package tracking system and see for yourself the POWER OF SQBX.
Friday, November 12. 2010
We are pleased to introduce you to our latest member of the SQBX tracking family. We have taken SQBX to a level that is heads and shoulders above the competition. SQBX inbound tracking system now has the capability of creating pick up requests directly at the desktop of the end users. They will be able to create shipments inside SQBX using our powerful rating engine and schedule a pick up from the internal mail staff to get into the mail stream. These shipments can be internal mail documents using the companies mail delivery personnel or the shipment can be created so that it goes through common carriers like UPS and FEDEX. The process does not stop there. SQBX will now send an email to the end recipient acknowledging that the shipment has been picked up and all of the steps in the process can be scanned and tracked much like what you would find on the FEDEX tracking screens. This is an ideal application for large organizations that would like to track internal mail pieces within their organizations.
Friday, March 26. 2010
Our mobile software for SQBX inbound package tracking system just got faster. We have a team of developers working around the clock to improve the speed and functionality of our products. The voice from the field and our customer base has lead to the latest update of the software that resides on the mobile computers that we deploy. You are now able to do a complete download of all the the required fields or simply just pull down the receipts and recipients. This will dramatically shorten the time to synchronize which will translate into a more productive work environment for your staff. In addition to the turbo charged download, there are also new tabs to edit the signature when collecting a signature. SQBX is the most versatile and up to date web based package tracking system on the market. Our solution can even run on a smart phone. Can your package tracking system do that? We take great pride in our products and would love for you to see the power and speed first hand. Call today to schedule a live web demonstration
Monday, March 8. 2010
SQBX inbound package tracking system is a revolutionary web based receiving system. One of the reasons that separates this package tacking software from the crowd is SQBX's unparalleled speed. In an instant you will be able to click and find exactly what you are looking for being that we have built in many different methods to search for your missing package. Once you find the package, you will be able to drill down on the details of that package including when it was received, who did the receiving, when it was delivered, and who was the person that did the delivery. In addition to the staff information, you will also be able to view the signature of the recipient as well as the time and date that the transaction occurred. This proof of delivery can downloaded for emailing or it can be printed for your records. SQBX has taken the capture of the signature one step further. We have embedded the signature on a custom made watermark that provides an additional level of security to that signature. A package tracking system must be able to verify that a package has been received, delivered, and who signed for it. Our internal package tracking system will give you all of those capabilities with lightning speed. Being that the system is a web based parcel tracking software, you will be able to access the information that you are looking for anywhere you have an internet connection, even with a smart phone. SQBX internal package tracking system is simply the fastest way to locate a package that has been delivered to your organization. Contact us today to witness first hand the speed of SQBX package tracking solution. Ask about a free trial!
Tuesday, February 23. 2010
Whether you are tracking packages or tracking mail pieces it is important to have some type of package tracking software to do the leg work for you. The old fashion way of tracking a package once it has been delivered to your organization starts with a phone call down to the mail room or the receiving dock. At this point it is up to the personnel who are typically swamped with the sorting and routing of all of their inbound packages to research and locate the package that is in question. This process could take hours depending on the volume of packages received and when that particular package came in. Tracking parcels is not a simple procedure if you do not have the proper package tracking system in place. Here at Ubiquia we have designed a web based tracking solution called SQBX. This system makes tracking a package quick and easy. Since SQBX is web based we can provide global visibility of your mail/packages from any computer connected to the internet. This will reduce calls down to the mail room or loading dock to locate packages. In addition to finding the package quickly in the system, SQBX is also a proof of delivery software. With the use of a mobile device you can capture a signature of the recipient and prove that a certain person had signed for the package at a given point in time. All of this information can be visible if the user has been granted access to the system. SQBX is simply the fastest and most powerful tool to implement for your package tracking needs. Whether you require a complex enterprise package tracking system that covers multiple locations or are just looking for a simple one site installation, SQBX is the best way to track a parcel or package. Contact us today to see the power of  SQBX first hand with a live demonstration.
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