Integrity of the 'Certified' Original
One reason the TripPak document management services works is that many shippers accept a "certified" copy from TripPak as they would an original. That kind of confidence has been built up painstakingly over time.
According to TMI's Mark Cleveland, his company has worked with the shippers that use its 700 carrier customers, including Schneider National, J.B. Hunt, Swift Transportation, Landstar, U.S. Xpress and many other major fleets.
TripPak holds original documents in trust for both carrier and shipper, Cleveland explained. Most of the shippers involved trust the integrity of copies provided through TripPak; that confidence makes it possible for a Land Transportation agent to request that TripPak provide a "certified" copy of an original rather than the original itself. Shipper faith in the copy as an original can quickly resolve billing problems.
Cleveland said that TripPak certifies copies of originals using the digital equivalent of a "watermark," the kind of transparent marking used by makers of fine stationary for example. TripPak's digital watermark includes information about that document, including its scan date, location and other data. Shippers trust that TripPak has not altered that original in any way, say by adding a signature.
"We have every reason to maintain the integrity of the process, to be able to offer the sustainable, repeatable capture of an original," Cleveland said.
TripPak keeps an eye out for copies submitted as originals.
"There are times when the driver or somebody will send us a photocopy of a document. We see that. We can tell it's not the original. So we stamp 'copy' on it and we certify that this is a copy of a document. This is the document we received. It's not an original," said Cleveland.
"Our people make that judgment. That's another thing that makes people confident."
Even so, some shippers still require the paper original.
"There are still shippers who will not pay from an image that we create. They're about 2% of the transactions our community touches today," he said.
Return to main article
