Carrier updates and Event reporting from Logistics business network (LBN) to freight order in Transportation management ( TM ) of S/4HANA

Logistics Business Network (LBN) as described in my earlier blogpost https://blogs.sap.com/2021/08/27/freight-collaboration-with-sap-logistics-business-network-lbn-and-its-integration-with-sap-transportation-management-tm/ is becoming popular with customers because of its rich functionalities with Track & trace , Event reporting etc. Recently, I did a Proof of Concept (PoC) with Carrier updates and Event reporting from LBN to Freight order in Transportation Management ( TM ) of S/4HANA for an Electronic goods manufacturing company and thought to share my learning & experience in this blogpost.

The high level requirement has been described in below Image. Freight order is sent to the carrier for Confirmation by carrier  (1) . Carrier should then check the details of the transport in the freight order and update the information with Truck (vehicle) number & the name of the Driver and those information are to be updated to the freight order (2). Freight order then subsequently becomes ready for reporting in LBN by the carrier. Standard events like Delay, Exception, Proof of pick up (or delivery) etc can be reported by the carrier through LBN Portal. The customer wanted that if there is any delay in either Pick up or delivery by the carrier for t5hat freight order , then that should be reported to the freight order (3) and an email should be triggered to the concerned person (4) stating the reason for the delay.

The above flow has been illustrated with relevant screenshots from TM on S/4HANA and LBN in below images.

(1) A XML message is triggered in freight order in TM on S/4HANA to LBN on ‘Sent to Carrier’ from the freight order and the same freight order appears in LBN for ‘Confirm’ or ‘Reject’ by the carrier as in below image.

(2) Carrier confirms the freight order with App ‘Freight orders for Confirmation’ and updates with License plate & the name of the driver and these information are updated in freight order in TM on S/4HANA as in below image.

(3) Once the freight order is confirmed, then the freight order appears in App ‘Freight orders for reporting’ in LBN. In case of any delay in pick up , Carrier updates the freight order with LBN app ‘Freight orders for reporting’ that there will be ‘Delay’ in Pick up of the transport due to ‘Heavy snow fall’ and the same is updated in freight order as in below image.

(4) An email is triggered to the concerned person/s with the reason for the delay as displayed in SOST and as shown in below image.

Many customers will be looking for this functionality for the required collaboration with carrier and Transportation manager .This is just one of the several scenarios that can be modelled with LBN with TM . It appears from the demands from several customers that LBN is becoming one of the proven applications for collaboration, event reporting with carriers etc for complex logistic execution scenarios.

This blogpost is based on my tests , observations and insights with LBN and TM in S/4HANA. Will appreciate your feedback and comments.