Centralised planning addresses Spoornet's wagon shortage

Joy Orlek AS AN under-supply of rail wagons continues to impact negatively on Spoornet's service levels, general manager commercial Harry Mashele is confident that significant headway was made last year to better utilise the available fleet. "Our 2000-strong customer base has now been segmented, leaving Spoornet to look after its 300 key account customers. The remainder is served through consolidation by Viamax," says Mashele. "If you look at the number of tariff requests we get every day, we were not able to focus on service for our key customers." And while Mashele admits that service is still not up to par, he believes that mutual co-operation would go a long way to solving the problem. "The shortage of wagons is a growing problem and we have to do things differently to address it." One of the solutions is centralised planning and execution, and the scrap industry is a successful case in point. "They have reduced the number of loading points from 1800 to 200. They have also increased utilisation by switching from single wagons to five loads per chain which has freed up some capacity. "We're looking at similar systems in other industries where a lot of cargo still moves in single wagons. "We understand that customers want to receive small packages, but these can be handled in such a way that capacity is better utilised. Instead of sending a wagon a day, for example, we can consolidate the loads and send two a week." The objective for the year 2002 will be to stabilise the systems that have already been put in place and to work with customers in joint planning and execution, which has stymied Spoornet's efforts until now. "We can't expect things always to work like clockwork," Mashele concedes. "But lack of planning by the customer impacts on us." A lot of headway has been made in the grain, coal and fertiliser industries to achieve mutually beneficial results. The same efforts will be replicated in other sectors, says Mashele. And while an attempt to change years of conditioning cannot yield immediate results, Mashele is confident that Spoornet is making progress. "We still can't meet the demand for wagons, but we feel that we are more in control." The utility will continue to invest R1bn a year for the next 15 years which will not only see the purchase of new wagons but also loading and offloading equipment and information technology.