Visualising and recording - a good business investment
by Jorg Stiller
Faced with mounting demands from their insurers for effective damage prevention measures and a faster and better substantiated response to customer claims for lost or damaged goods, Spedition Gras a distribution company based in Neuwied, western Germany, found a technical solution which has solved these problems and significantly reduced their costs. The effectiveness of their new digital CCTV monitoring system has far exceeded their expectations: it has led to considerable improvements in operational efficiency, safety and security, eliminated most customer claims, and paid for itself about five times faster than forecast.
The CCTV system, supplied by GEUTEBRÜCK GmbH and installed by W.I.S. Sicherheit GmbH & Co. KG, came into service in February 2002. It includes 61 cameras, 4 MultiScope II units networked together via Ethernet, a 1.2 Tera Byte video database and five workstations. The MultiScope II devices each handle 16 video channels and provide the systems digital recording, transmission and event management capabilities.
Efficient oversight
Cameras cover the warehouse, the trans-shipment area, 60 loading bays and the site entrance, providing a complete overview of the site, and enabling better management with faster, more efficient working procedures. Staff at the workstations can see all the loading bays, trucks and trailers in the yard. They can immediately direct new arrivals to free bays, tell the driver where to deposit his trailer, or where to pick one up. Having on-screen pictures for reference, means staff avoid many errors and misunderstandings because they are no longer so reliant on the drivers information, and they can see for themselves that their instructions are followed correctly, that he takes the right container or hitches up the right trailer.
With one camera surveying each pair of loading bays, the system can monitor all loading and unloading activity. As each package, or pallet is unloaded and the data from its barcode is scanned into the warehouse management system, its arrival is independently also being documented by the CCTV system. This records the picture data into a ring memory where it is stored for about 2½ months, after which it is automatically transferred onto digital tape and kept until two years old. Whenever goods are lost, damaged or queried for whatever reason, the ring memory and the archives can be searched according to scanning date and time, to pull out a visual record of what was unloaded or loaded, where, how and by whom. Cameras in the warehouse document what happens to goods at other times, who puts them into stock, where they are stored, when they are picked, packed etc. This extensive traceability has significantly reduced stocking errors and the pictures have enabled Spedition Gras to avoid or deflect most claims for lost or damaged goods because they can now prove that the goods were already damaged when they arrived, or that they were still intact when loaded into a third-party vehicle.
Spedition Gras 6: With the whole site in view, managers have been able to improve working procedures and the efficient flow of goods.
Safer workplace
Since the health and safety officer has had access to the video record of warehouse activity including all forklift truck movements, he has been able to determine the cause of accidents, identify hazards and black-spots where near-misses occur, and together with other staff, take action to eliminate bad working practices. The system has enabled him to improve the companys accident record and reduce its associated insurance costs.
Detection and deterrence
As an insider or an outsider it is now very much more difficult to steal from the site without being caught. A card-based system controls all staff access to the site and the office, and the four selected staffs who with access to the video recording equipment do not have system clearance to edit past history. Only the system administrator has the special password required.
During 2002 the CCTV systems recorded pictures enabled police to clear up three cases of theft, and the company is now confident that the blanket recording of all the loading and unloading activity together with the date, time and registration details of all vehicles and trailers together act a strong deterrent against further crime. As a result, Gras has been able to cut guarding costs and now only employs security staff on site at night over public holiday periods. They propose in future to dispense completely with on-site guarding and replace it with video motion detection triggering alarm picture transmission by ISDN to the remote W.I.S. emergency call centre where duty staff will decide whether to investigate further or to alert the police.
Customers benefit too
The extra efficiency, security and traceability, which the CCTV system provides Spedition Gras, benefit the distribution companys customers too. They get a faster, more reliable service, and if they want confirmation of the whereabouts or condition of a particular shipment while it is in the Gras distribution centre, they can receive both scan data and pictures by email.
Why Geutebrück?
Before choosing the Geutebück CCTV system Spedition Gras considered a number of different digital systems offering near live video pictures. The search for the right one took Herr Reusch, their project manager, to Cologne, Saarbrücken and Buchholz, to other distribution companies and to a number of banks. We chose the best system available on the market for monitoring all areas of our business, he explained. Geutebrücks is one of the few which can record while simultaneously transmitting, replaying, copying, writing to CD etc. without losing any data.
Spedition-e: Already planning to expand their system, Spedition Gras has some new developments in mind.
Impressed with Geutebrücks service, fast response and individual, tailor-made solution, Herr Reusch has already recommended them to fellow logistics companies in the IDS network. And he is only too happy to admit that he was a long way out on the estimate of payback date. He was expecting his company to recoup the investment in five years but in fact the system will have paid for itself in about a year.
Future plans
More than satisfied with the performance of the equipment installed in 2002, Spedition Gras has expansion plans for 2003. Besides installing the ISDN link to enable the use of the remote W.I.S. emergency call centre, the company intends to add about eight more cameras and another MultiScope to eliminate the last few blind spots on the site; to upgrade to MultiMap, GEUTEBRÜCKs site-plan-based interactive user interface; and to expand the current database to about 4 Tera Bytes. Also under consideration are one or more dome cameras to provide some pan and zoom capacity within the warehouse, and automatic number plate recognition to replace the current video-supported manual identification procedure for trucks and trailers. Other new GEUTEBRÜCK developments which integrate the barcode data from wireless scanners into recorded picture data are also on the Spedition Gras wish list since this will provide fast picture search by barcode and even easier and more comprehensive traceability.