If you know which carrier you wish to send a consignment with and you need to create a series of consignments quickly, MachShip has developed the consignment generation method called Quick Consignment. This screen is constructed to work via keyboard shortcuts and tabbing to try and limit the need for mouse clicking and will send all consignment creation requests to the printing app. 

Below sample demo video on how to create a consignment in MachShip:



                       

How to navigate to Quick Consignment Screen 

• To get to the Create Consignment screen, from the top menu Create/Manage, click Quick Consignment under the Consignments section.

• Or you can alternatively use the link here.  

Quick Consignment screen

The Quick Consignment screen layout is very similar to the quote and standard create consignment views. The user is required to provide pickup location details, delivery location details, answer any questions, references and then add in the relevant items. 

• • Location Name: As you type in the location name, MachShip will suggest the best match from your saved locations, once selected, the location’s address will fill all the relevant fields. If it is a new location, you can manually fill in everything and click on “save address” link to save it to your saved locations. Before it is created, you will need to specify the location type just like when you add a new location from Create Location screen.
    
    
    
    
  • Required fields for the Pickup and Delivery Location Section are: Location Name, Address 1 and Suburb.
    
    
    
    
  • Extra fields for Delivery Location:
    
    
    • Send Tracking Email: If this option is selected, MachShip will send any tracking update to the selected email.
      
      
    • Delivery Special Instructions: If you enter anything in this field, it will show up in the printed documents and could be used to provide extra information for the driver at the delivery location. 
      
      
      
      
      
• Items: Enter the items that are being delivered in this section. All dimensions are in cm's and all weights are in kg's. Note that these are LINE ITEMS so the weight should be item weight NOT total weight. MachShip will multiple out for totals. 
  
  
  
  
  • Very Frequent Items: It works similarly to Very Frequent Locations, it will allow you to select an item from your frequent item list if you have any. Once you select an item, it will add the item with its information to the item list, similar to the image below.
    
    
    
    
• Item Name: It is an optional field. If what you type matches with a saved item, it will populate the item type and dimensions, if not, you will need to manually fill in all fields as they are all required. 
  
  
  
  Once you have added the shipping items then you will be able to assign:
  
  
• add DG items: This option is made available if your company is provided access to consign Dangerous Goods. By clicking on the add DG Items link will result in the Add Dangerous Goods modal. You may click on this link on how to Add the Dangerous Goods information.
  
  
  
  
• add item Contents: This functionality will enable users to be able to specify a description for the item contents along with references and quantities. You may click on this link on how to Add the Item Contents information.
  
  

• Despatch Date: Select your desired despatch date.

The key difference between the quick consignment page and the standard consignment page is the carrier selection options.

Expanded Carrier Selection:

• Carrier Selection: The carrier selection method for the quick consignment page has a couple of default views, these will be pre-set by your freight consultant for most efficient use of the system.
  
  These selection methods can be:
  
  Specify Carrier  - YES
  
                                                   
  
  
• Expanded Carrier Selection: The expanded carrier selection section will prompt the user to select the carrier from a series of drop downs. These dropdowns are Carrier, Account, and Service.
  MachShip will pre-fill any information it can. For example, if you had one account with a carrier this would be auto-filled after carrier selection.
  
  
  
  
• Service Groups: There are certain occasions where a carrier will have what is known as Service Groups. Service Groups are how MachShip will internally assign a set of services which have a similar attribute. For example, local transport companies can have Standard, Express, VIP and Premium options for the same vehicle size. If you select a carrier which has a service group, then you will need to make one more selection level to choose which service group you want.
  
  
  
  
• Specify Carrier - NO
  
                                                     
  
  
  
• Route Selection Method: If you do not wish to specify the carrier then all you will need to supply MachShip with will be if you wish to create the consignment via the cheapest method possible or the fastest ETA.
  
  
  
  
• Short Carrier Selection:
  
  
  The short carrier selection is a condensed selection of the above and works best for users who have a small number of carriers and services to select from. As can be seen from the below, this method of service selection only has one dropdown which will contain every carrier, service, and account which is available to you in MachShip. The list of carriers can be sorted in alphabetical order of the carrier abbreviation or the service name.
  
  
  

• Route Carrier Selection:
  Selectable via the below:

  

  The Route Carrier Selection option will quote all available freight options for you as you finalise the consignment. Pricing will be shown as a scrollable listing that is ordered based on your company's specified price ordering. 
  
  

  

  Simply select your desired option and it will appear in the Selected Route option as can be seen below:

   

  

  
  
• Carrier Specific Options: If you select any of the carrier selection methods under Specify Carrier - YES then if the chosen carrier has specific questions or options, these will appear on the screen under the pickup and delivery section. These fields will all change depending on the carrier. 
  
  For example, Toll Express requires to fill in the fields below: 
  
  
  
  For Startrack these will be 

•  Consignment Creation: The premise of the Quick Consignment creation method is to enable a user to manually create a set of consignments in quick time one after the other. 
  
  There are three methods to create a consignment:
  
  Note: For all methods below and if set up, a call to the MachShip Printing Application to print labels and documentation will be made.
  
  
  • Create (Ctrl + S): This method will create the consignment and clear all fields except for default information.
    
    
  • and Keep Details (Ctrl + Shift + S): This will create the consignment and maintain all the information which was entered. This will be useful if you have several consignments to create to the same location on the same carrier and service. It can also be advantageous if you only have a small amount of information to change for the next consignment.  
    
    
  • and Keep Carrier Details (Ctrl + Alt + S): This will create the consignment and refresh the page, clearing the delivery and item details. This method is useful if the user is to create multiple consignments for the same carrier one after another. 
    
    
  • and Create Return (Ctrl + Shift + R): This will create the consignment (and completed the applicable label task) and then refresh to the create consignment page with all the same details (i.e Pickup, Delivery, Items, references, date and time) of the consignment just created except that the Pickup and Delivery will have been reversed allowing for the creation of a return.
    
    

                                                       

Note: Notice that on the quick consignment screen, there are 2 Create buttons set on the upper and lower right corner of the screen - do take note this have the same functionality upon creating a consignment.