Create and Configure a Lane Risk Assessment

1. Defining Additional Information in LRAs
2. Road Transport
3. Pick-Up and Drop-Off Points
4. Parking Stops, Border Crossings, or Ferry Crossings
5. Warehouse
6. Additional Pick-Up and Drop-Off Sub-Steps

A Lane in Validaide consists of general information and a transport route with a combination of transport steps and transit points.

Creating a new lane

How to create an air lane.

How to create an ocean lane.

How to create a road risk assessment (road lane).

Lane and SOP bulk actions.

Defining Additional Information in LRAs

After creating the Lane, you can add various additional information in the Configuration page, such as General Information related to the Parties involved in the Lane, Product Information, Packaging Information, Booking Information, and Lane Performance. 

Adding General Information in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can add and modify General Information, including the Name, Internal Reference, Incoterms, and a description of the lane.

Adding Parties and Locations Involved in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can define which parties and locations are involved in the lane. Under the Parties tab, they can specify the Forwarder, the Customer, the Primary Carrier, the Packaging Manufacturer, and additional parties.

Under the Locations tab, users can define which location is responsible for the lane, along with the origin and destination location.

Under the Customer Locations tab, the customer of a lane can add their origin and destination locations. Customer locations refer to offices responsible for the lane, as well as export and import documentation. They serve as the point of contact for any lane-related questions but are not the physical origin or destination of the actual lane.

Adding Product Information in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can define product information for products included in the lane. Under the General tab, they can choose between Defined products and Manual product entries.

For Defined Products, users can select their own products they have entered into the system. 

These products can be found under the Products menu on the left-hand side.

For Manual product entry, users can select a predefined product category, define the product's temperature range inside the packaging, and add a product description.

When Manual product entry is selected, a new tab, "Dangerous Goods," becomes available. In this tab, users can select the dangerous goods classification and add comments.

Adding Packaging Information in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can define packaging information for packaging products used in the lane. Under the General tab, they can choose between the Defined Packaging and Manual Packaging entry.

For Defined Packaging, users can select their own packaging solutions they have entered into the system. 

These packaging solutions can be found under the Packaging menu on the left-hand side.

For Manual packaging entry, users can select a predefined packaging type, define the payload dimensions, specify the refrigerant used, and add a packaging description.

When Manual packaging entry is selected, a new tab, "Shipping," becomes available. In this tab, users can define the qualified duration of the packaging and the transport shipment instructions for the packaging.

Adding Booking Information in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can define Booking Information, including the booked temperature range for transport and storage, the number of pallets booked, chargeable weight per pallet (kg), shipping days, and the proposed date for the first shipment.

Adding User Roles in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can modify the responsible person and approver. 

When a forwarder creates a lane and starts the workflow, they are prompted to define responsible and approver roles. Once the lane is shared with the manufacturer, the forwarder can assign approvers and contributors from the manufacturer’s side in the second tab, which becomes available upon sharing the lane.

Modifying Settings in LRAs

Users can select which modules to enable for a lane. By default, all four modules - Temperature Graph, Assessment, Weather and Sustainability - are selected, making their corresponding tabs available on the lane page. If any module is deselected, its tab will no longer be visible.

Adding actual Lane Performance in LRAs

When creating a lane, users can add actual lane performance. This enables them to document incidents on a lane during shipments. Only users at the company that owns the lane (created it) can make such changes. If a lane is being shared with a customer, e.g., a manufacturer, they can edit this information if they are a Tenant Administrator. Tenant Administrators can perform these actions when a lane is in any of any workflow status except for no workflow. This allows pharma manufacturers to document and maintain performance data of lanes they own as well as lanes shared by forwarders.

The lane performance can be added in any workflow stage, even Reviewed. The number of shipments during the period should be indicated. Incidents are differentiated into two types:

• Temperature-Generic - filling in only one number, the total of temperature incidents.
• Non-Temperature - The user gets a list with generic categories.

Under the assessment, a user sees a lane performance tab. This will be included in the PDF export. When a lane with added lane performance is being shared with a customer, under the “Assessment tab” the customer can see Lane Performance. 

How to add a product in Validaide?

Shipment categories in a lane performance.

Classification

Lane Classifications can be assigned in the Configuration tab, under the Classification card. Lane Classifications are visible in the following areas:

• The Lane Listing page, under All Lanes, My Lanes, and My Location Lanes
• Internal users within the company
• Lane exports, including:
  • Lane PDF
  • Lane CSV
  • Lane JSON

Because classification labels are organization-specific, sharing parties will only see the classifications defined within their own organization.

The Lane Audit Trail displays only the default system values (e.g., Class 1, Class 2) rather than the customized names. This ensures the classification naming conventions remain private to each organization. The main Audit Trail also records the creation, changes, and deletion of classification names.

The following roles can update the Lane Classification on a lane:

• Tenant Administrators
• Responsible User
• Contributors (internal and external)
• QA (internal and external)
• Approvers (internal and external)

Users can filter lanes based on the defined Lane Classifications. When a lane is copied, its classification settings are copied automatically.

Road transport

A road step can be added practically anywhere in the lane. When adding this step, you need to define the road transport company and the transit duration.

Ocean carriers can be selected as road carriers in a lane step if the company has been set up to provide road transport or under “My Locations”, Configuration>Suppliers, as road transport providers.

In addition, you can indicate additional details for the Lane Risk Assessment, such as:

• Location: When a Company Location uses multiple trucking providers, the Location can be selected as a road transport provider. First, select your own Company, and then select the specific Location (which must be configured to provide Road Transport)
• Booked temperature range: you can select it to be the same as the rest of the lane, or you can set a different temperature range (none, FRO, COL, ERT, CRT)
• Expected temperature: if the truck is not temperature-controlled, which is used to determine the ambient temperature of a shipment during road transport.
• Security threat level: in the geographical area of the road transport, which can be set to Low, Medium, and High. This is a user-defined indicator for the relative safety of the geographical area of road transport. This information is used in combination with the Supplier's security capabilities to determine the Security Assessment. 
• Country security risk: The risk of origin and destination country is compared, and the system chooses the worst case. If one of the countries does not have a risk scoring, it takes the available one, if none has a risk scoring, it is shown as insufficient and is not considered when calculating the total risk score.

More on Road steps.

 Pick-Up and Drop-Off Points

You can add the pick-up and drop-off points, which are normally the shipper's and the consignee's addresses. These locations do not influence the risk assessed, but the geographical location is used to visualize the Lane and calculate the distance for road steps.

The Pick-Up and Drop-Off Points can be defined in two ways:

• Validaide Location: you can select a Location that is defined in Validaide as a pick-up or drop-off point.
• Manual address: you can define any address as a pick-up or drop-off point, supported by a Google search to search for specific facilities or company addresses.

Parking Stops, Border Crossings, or Ferry Crossings

You can add parking stops, border crossings, and ferry crossings to the lane. Please click here to read more about these steps.

Warehouse

A warehouse is a Location in Validaide where cargo is stored. It can be your own company or one of your suppliers’ locations.

This location has to be owned by an existing company in Validaide.

A warehouse step can be added before and after a flight, a road step, or another warehouse step.

Check the following article on how to modify or edit Warehouse steps. 

How to create your own view of a supplier location?

Ambient Temperature Exposure.

Additional Pick-Up and Drop-Off Sub-Steps

• When selecting the pickup/drop off option, the popup window includes General information (Duration and Description) and Location tabs. In the previous release, we introduced the ability to define separate pick-up and drop-off phases within a lane Road step. With this release, you also have the option to select a single phase that covers both actions, offering more flexibility during configuration.

• Each pick-up and drop-off sub-step is always followed by a Road transport sub-step. 

• It is possible to add up to 25 pick-up and drop-off sub-steps. 
• These sub-steps are reflected in the Lane PDF and JSON file downloads. 

Note: Users can download a Lane as a PDF or JSON file.

Note: When capabilities used in a lane are updated, the lane status itself does not change automatically. Instead, the forwarder will see a warning message on the lane. This message highlights the changes made. For the newly updated capabilities to be applied to the lane, the user must refresh the lane by clicking the button in the top right corner of the lane page. 

Note: My Location Lanes on the Lane page is the same functionality as filter Involved Location = <Work Location of me> In Any Role. This shows Lanes where My Work Location is Responsible, Origin, or Destination Location. This only works when the user has filled their Work Location in the User Profile.

Note: Mark a Lane as Active/Inactive in Any Workflow Status

Freight Forwarders can now update whether a Lane is currently used for transportation in any Lane workflow status. This removes the previous restriction where a Lane could only be marked inactive in “No Workflow” or “In Progress” status. The deactivation can be performed by the Tenant Administrator, Lane Responsible and the Contributor. 

The rest of the General Information card remains locked outside of “In Progress” status in the following statuses: External Review, External QA Review, Internal Review, Internal QA Review, About to Expire, Expired, and Approved. The deactivation is recorded in the Lane Audit trail and the Tenant Admin Audit Trail.