How to share a Lane or SOP with an external party.

Digital Collaboration with multiple Parties on Lanes and SOPs

To enable data sharing and digital collaboration, Validaide supports the sharing of Lanes and SOPs between multiple companies, including a joint approval process with digital signatures. 

For each Lane or SOP, Parties can be assigned in multiple roles, such as:

• Forwarder
• Customer
• Primary Carrier
• 4PL
• For SOPs: Importer of Record, Exporter of Record

The company that created the Lane or SOP will automatically be the Owner of the Lane or SOP. The Owner controls the definition and sharing with external parties, as well as the configuration of the Lane or SOP.

When a Lane is created by a forwarder, it may share this with a shipper and potentially also an air carrier and 4PL. When an SOP or Lane is created by a pharmaceutical manufacturer, this can be shared with its forwarder.

Lanes and SOPs can only be shared with companies that are active tenants on the Validaide platform.

Sharing Lanes and SOPs with external parties

In order to share a Lane or SOP, you just need to follow the steps below:

1. Go to the Configuration tab of the Lane or SOP that you would like to share.
2. Make sure that the external parties you would like to share the Lane or SOP with are defined as a party for that particular Lane. This can be done in the Parties form.
3. In the Data Sharing panel, you can click on the  button under the name of each company that you would like to share with.
   Note: if a company is not a tenant yet on Validaide, you can invite them directly from this page by clicking on the button.
4. Fill in the information in the pop-up window; select the user you would like to notify about the share and optionally leave a message for them.

In the Data Sharing panel in the Lane or SOP Configuration, you control the sharing with external parties:

Parties that you share the Lane or SOP with are indicated with the sharing icon:

You can also see which user started the sharing with the external party, and at what date.

Furthermore, it is possible to filter shared Lanes in the Lanes listing screen. 

You can stop sharing with an external party by clicking on the  button.

 

Note: this is not possible as long as you have external approvers assigned to this party. These users should first be de-selected to stop sharing the Lane or SOP.

How can my customer approve a lane?

In order to involve external approvers in your approval workflow (have your customer approve a lane or SOP with a digital signature) you first have to share the lane or SOP. After you have shared the lane or SOP another window will appear in the pop-up window.

You can later add or change involved users for unapproved lanes or SOPs by going to the "Version Control" tab by clicking on the pencil icon. 

Only users with Administrator access can add, remove, or change involved users in an Approved lane or SOP.

Connecting Lanes and SOPs of different users.

How do shared Lanes or SOPs look for the receiving party?

When you are sharing a Lane or SOP with an external company, this company can clearly see that your company is the Owner and this Lane or SOP being shared with them.

 

In the Listing screen for Lanes or SOP the shared Lane or SOP will be indicated with this icon:

Also in the header for the Lane or SOP, users will clearly see that the Lane or SOP was shared with them by you:

It is important to know that the external party cannot edit the Lane or SOP that you shared with them. They also cannot see the underlying details (Location Capabilities and Company Capabilities of your Suppliers).

 

To all the shared Lanes we add the following Disclaimer:

This Lane Risk Assessment has been created by [Company Name] based on our best effort to collect and review relevant information from suppliers and other third parties. However, we cannot make any representations or warranties as to the accuracy or completeness of data from external parties, and actual performance on the lane may be subject to change and contingency. As such, any rights with regard to the integrity of the content outlined in this document are disclaimed. For further details please refer to the Validaide User Agreement: http://www.validaide.com/terms-of-service

 

After you have shared a Lane, you can start an approval workflow with the external parties.

More on the approval workflow for a shared lane