Industry Day Part 1.pdf

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IND _0056 (Completed 08/13/25) Transcript by Rev.com

Speaker 1 (00:00:03):

Check 1, 1, 1, 1. Check. Check two. Check two, check three, check three.

Speaker 2 (00:01:53):

Alright. Good morning everybody. Welcome to the PCS Joint Task Force. My name is Christopher Frost.

I'm the PCS Joint Task Force Contracting Officer and I'll be your moderator and mc for today's event.

First and foremost, on behalf of the Joint Task Force, let me thank you for your attendance here today. I know everybody's busy. I know your time is valuable. I know this is an incredibly busy time of season.

This is an important subject, this is an important topic and this is an important event that we're executing today. Your participation here today is greatly appreciated and I look forward to an interactive dialogue for our industry day. First, lemme go over our plan of action, so some venue administrative items. There are restrooms on the back hallway over here and then on the other side of the other ballroom down the hallway. There are other restrooms.

(00:02:41):

We have coffee, water, and pastries here. If you'd like a fancier coffee, we have a coffee truck outside. It just showed up and they could provide you a higher quality coffee if you so desire. We asked if you did not pay the landing fee for our pastries here we ask that you please do so to reimburse the members who purchased those items for you. For emergency exits. These two doors on the left will go into a, although they are exits, they'll go into a hallway near the kitchen area. The back three doors will take you to that hallway and these two will take you out directly to the exit of the building in case there's any emergencies. Alright, after my opening of the plan here, we'll go through some introductions, the overview of what we're doing here today. We'll execute a discussion on our standards of conduct. We'll turn it over to Major General Curtis for his opening comments and then throughout the day we will go through problem statements one through four. Hopefully everybody had a chance to see these. They were posted to sam.gov. If you didn't, don't worry. We have the prompts here today and we really look forward to your discussion. Once we're done with that, we will have closing comments and at any time if you have questions or concerns, I will point out members of my team to direct those to so we can assist you immediately.

(00:03:55):

Okay. First and foremost, let me introduce our PCF Joint Task Force Leadership Team. We have Major General Curtis. He's the commanding general of the Joint Task Force and he's assisted by his deputy, Mr.

CJ Douglas, the deputy to the Commanding General. Additionally, we have our experts on the panel today for the Joint Task Force. We'll begin on my right, your left with Colonel Paul Lata. He's the director of our strategy for the Joint Task Force, followed by Colonel Michael Ashton or Mike. He is the acting director of the Defense Personal Property Management Office. We also have Lieutenant Colonel John Ton, he's the operations officer for the Joint Task Force. And finally, Ms. Linda Lang covering our acquisitions. Additionally, if you're on my team, if you could please stand up these, my team if you could please stand up. I'm your moderator. Again, my name is Chris Frost. Please feel free to ask me any questions when I'm not up on the microphone, but if you do have questions, everybody on my team over here, Mr. RJ Hilman, Andrew McLean, Lauren Lang Hauser, Ashley Johannes and Reagan Lumy are here to help you. They'll walk around if you have questions. If you have comment cards, which we do have over there, please raise your hand. They're happy to come over and see you. Last but not least is our Nikki Radkey is outside who helped with agenda and registration. She's also here if you have any questions.

(00:05:11):

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Okay, let's get into this. So I would prefer to actually flip flop the slide for you and ask you to focus on the right side first, the purpose of today. We are here to solicit your industry experts and your advice creating an equal and fair opportunity to put for the joint task force consideration. It is critical that we get your insight and feedback into this program and improvement process that leads to our mission statement. I won't read the entire mission statement as everybody here is qualified to read, but I would like to point out the Bulletized bottom line. We are here to make the PCS relocation process better for our service members. Our service members, their families and DOD civilians deserve a high quality move and that is why we are here today to solicit your and feedback. On the other side of the slide, you'll see what we're going to do today for our agenda.

(00:06:03):

So after our opening comments and remarks, we will get immediately into our problem statements.

These problem statements are designed to foster interactive dialogue between the industry participants and the joint task force panel. There is a microphone in the center of the aisle which we will ask you to please get up and discuss. I understand that there may be a line, I totally get that we do have some standards of conduct we'll talk about for that, but this is your critical opportunity to provide the feedback you need to give to the joint task force. These problem statements will start with innovative commercial practices. Workforce innovation will shift over after our launch to a program structure pricing and claims, and then we'll really focus on commercial industry ideas. And finally, open comments for industry, if you will consider this is a transcending from customer focused to what program do we use and what's the benefits of pros or cons. And finally, how can industry really, really drive home innovative or solutions? So it is meant to transcend from a customer experience, which is why we're here to how can industry support and improve that. On the agenda, we do have a one hour for lunch.

We will, since we didn't get food trucks when this was developed, we'll spread that out to an hour 15 and we'll either cut problem statement too short or problem statement three. During that time, we'll make a judgment call.

(00:07:24):

Okay, I'm not here to belabor the standards of conduct. Hopefully everybody had a chance to read again. They were posted on sam.gov. I'll make a few critical points. Number one is that we have to conduct this in a reasonable and efficient manner. I understand there's a hundred plus industry representatives here, large and small. There's a lot of people who have different inputs. I respect that and I cannot wait to hear what you guys have to say. With that being said, we also have to have an efficient process by following the lines being responsible with one another. Additionally, we are not entertaining one-on-one meetings with anybody on the joint task force. It's not because we don't want to have your one-on-one input. It's because we have to create a fair and transparent event for everybody to provide their opinion. It's important that we do this to keep a standard level base level effort for everybody.

(00:08:13):

There could be potentially future interactions, so today may not be your last day to provide inputs, but if this is the last one you attend, we have six to six and a half hours dedicated for your discussion points with solely the joint Task force panel that is up here today. Please have respectful dialogue if your input has already been said by somebody else, ditto it. Please don't repeat the same lines. We have a lot of information to get through today. That would be very helpful. If someone does say something and you want to add to it, please do so. It would be very important. One thing when you come up to the microphone, please state your name and company so the transcription recording that is going on right now will record it and I will try to remind people as they come up, we will conduct strict adherence to our times today because we have short time with everybody.

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(00:08:59):

And then content and scope. I would very much appreciate if we can look on forward facing improvements. I understand that there's a lot of members in this audience today that have a lot of history under the previous contracts and the previous decisions made under the tender program.

Respectfully, you understand that this is not the forum for that discussion. This forum is today is for you to provide your expertise that none of us have on how to make this program better. I'm not saying we can't allude to that bad stuff, but let's not hammer it down. Let's say this is why it didn't work, but this is what can fix it. I will attempt to keep everybody online with that today and I would very much appreciate if you could do the same. And finally, if there is challenges or non-compliance, we will ask you to please calm down. We'll give you a verbal warning, but if you are unable to do so, we do reserve the right to remove anybody, any participant in this room due to failure of non-compliance. With that, I will pause. I'll turn it over to Major General Curtis for opening comments.

Speaker 3 (00:10:07):

We cannot change

Speaker 4 (00:10:09):

The beginning, but we can change the end. I'm going to speak right here. Yes sir. We're in this together and I need your brain. That's why you're here. There is no particular fault in this process. It's a compilation of things where we have opportunities for improvement and I'm asking for your help. Who here has heard of the term fourth component? I know several in here have because I see a lot of faces that are recognized. You are the fourth component. So today as the command in general of the joint task force, I'm asking for the fourth component to help just like you have always done in the past. The 13th of May, I received a phone call and on that phone call I was informed that we were going to stand up this task force and we were going to do some things differently. I have a report that's due to the Secretary of Defense by the 5th of September and there is no way that I'm going to do that report without your input. That's why we asked you here today. Now we've received input before this and some other forms, but we felt the right thing to do was to bring you together today and to talk about this.

(00:11:37):

My background is in logistics. Several of you know me from the NDTA and the conversations that we've had there. We have to make things better for the service members. That's the bottom line. I know most of you here do not need us. Let's be frank, you'd probably do just fine without the military because you have other portions of your business, but we do need each other because the mission that we provide to the American people is absolutely vital. And your patriots, I know that obviously you want to make a good living and there's nothing wrong with that, but we've got to work together to make things better for the service members. I just want you to know upfront, that's the lens that I look through what is best for the service member and that's what drives us.

(00:12:38):

We're not here today just to identify problems. Identifying problems, quite frankly is the easiest thing.

It's finding the solutions that is the toughest. We're going to get a wide array of ideas today. I welcome that. I call it a shot of brains with my folks. So I need your shot of brains today on what we can do better.

I want to express my gratitude for your written submissions. Several of you have provided those.

They've been extremely helpful. We take your input seriously and I just want to go over a few things to ground us. What you see before you is the charter that we have briefed with the Secretary of Defense https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=539.25 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=607.86 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=609.15 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=697.62 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=758.47 and you can see the main anchoring points within that charter. I want to talk a little bit about some of the feedback that we've received. To date collaboration is key. It's why we set up industry day depends on the performance at the curb quite obviously, and we have to work together. That's part of the collaboration. The second main anchoring point that we received as far as input was customer satisfaction matters. And I was very pleased to see that that was input coming from the fourth component. The third was workforce stability is essential.

(00:14:05):

The fourth was claims reduction is a priority, and the fifth was the economic pressures on the industry.

And I'm very interested to hear about that today. We're going to have to make fact bake fact based decisions, but I want to absolutely understand the economic aspects to the industry. So we're looking for partners who are going to do several things, provide exceptional service, embrace new technology, and we're very interested in the best practices. Let's look at the bullets that we have on the chart in front of you. Trust when we talk to these service members, they say that they want their household good, their household goods be treated as memories. And I've heard the stories about individuals who have had bad experiences. Fortunately most do not, but they said we want our household goods treated as memories, timeliness on-time, pickup and delivery, accountability with defined standards, oversight, responsibilities and incentives and consequences tied to that accountability and finally modernization.

Making it faster, more transparent in the communication process. So today I look forward to your input.

If you have something, this is the time to bring it forward, please. My brief to the SEC D as I mentioned is on the 5th of September and I want to be sure that I carry your equities in that process. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being here. I appreciate the fourth component and I'm excited to hear what you have to say. Thank you. Thanks Chris.

Speaker 2 (00:15:59):

Alright, we got that 15 minutes back right away, so this is good news. Okay, so again, water, coffee's in the back, restroom, please feel free. We've got an 80 minutes on the timer we're going to set up here.

So again, just to kind of level set how this is going to execute, I will throw out some prompts and questions on problem statement one, focus on customer and innovative improvements for service members. This is your time, so I'll throw 'em out. We really hope industry gets up and just kind of starts talking and the dialogue will be with the joint task force panel. So moving on right away to our first problem statement. Problem statement one, innovative commercial practices. What can we do to improve service for our service members? We know that this is important. We know that they expect quality at the curb in a quality move, what it updates are available, what innovative practices are available to meet these service member needs. And finally, what are commercial packing standards?

These are prompted questions to help the joint task force understand the basics, but I implore you, please do not limit yourself to these questions. If you have ideas, we can. These are prompts. We welcome the discussion points to go further. So with that being said, I will pause and welcome industry to please get up to the microphone, state your name and the company and provide the inputs that you have wanted to provide to the joint task force.

(00:17:32):

I'll say don't all rush at once.

Speaker 5 (00:17:33):

No surprise to my industry colleagues, O dead Kar DM, van Lines, I'll kick this off. Thank you. The major general and to the members of the task force. The first bullet point here says, what can we do to https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=845.47 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=959.57 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1052 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1053.92 improve service to our service? And I think that one thing as industry is we have all this data aggregated about the program industry-wide on time pickup, on time delivery, CSS claims data. But we're not given.

We're being told that we have to be better, but we're not given any KPIs, right? You're at a 97%, you need to be at 98%. We need some feedback from the people that are managing the program to let us know what are acceptable levels of performance, right? Once we set those goals, we as an industry can work towards them and we can hopefully achieve them. Now I think a lot of us in the industry here are looking at the, especially compared to what happened to GHC and what this program has historically been and said, look, the numbers right now are pretty good CSS on time pickup, on time delivery.

(00:18:39):

Certainly there is a bit of a flex during peak season when the stress is higher, we see certain one of these metrics go down. But overall we think we're doing pretty good. But other than the MPS minimum performance score, right, where you're telling us as A TSP, this is the minimum score that you have to achieve in order to continue. In our program, we have no food feedback loop, right? And so when we're saying improve, get better, what is better? And I think that is critical to the goal that you're trying to achieve. Thanks and I'd encourage a few others to get up.

Speaker 6 (00:19:22):

My name's Howard Moore, aaa moving in storage, Fort Rucker, Alabama. I'm a local owner of a local agent and I think one thing that would help us is to have uniform training at the curb level. In other words, something that as a industry that we are required to have each of our individual movers trained at that level. And if we had something some way the DOD or some way a TA or someone could feed that information at an affordable cost to the local agent so that we could train our people better how to service their customer better. Thank you.

Speaker 7 (00:20:06):

Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity, Steve McKenna of the Allied Van Lines. Fundamentally, I think to be innovative and to bring the innovations to this channel, I would caution you as you develop the rules of operation to not box us in. Historically we've been boxed in on bringing innovation to this client. We're anxious to do that technology. There's all sorts of things that can be brought forward to this group, but we are often stymied by rules that don't allow changes and opportunities, test things and prove things generally. So I would encourage you not to really think seriously about the, I know that you would about the rules of operation. So we're able to be more, bring more of that innovation to this particular

Speaker 8 (00:21:07):

Sir, I appreciate that comment. Would you mind elaborating a little bit on how you feel like industry's been boxed in previously?

Speaker 7 (00:21:15):

I think the classic example that we have is driver technologies. The industry has advocated and advanced electronic inventories for years, but for many years we weren't allowed to apply that to the military member because the rule said there had to be a paper document provided to the member. So we were boxed out of this 15, 20% of our business not being able to apply that. So we would have to tell drivers to do one thing for all these customers, but you can't do it for this customer. That's probably the classic https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1119.48 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1162.29 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1206.57 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1267.84 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1275.94 example of a rule or a law or a process that wasn't acceptable to the military over the years, that has slowed us down on advancing that. Thank you.

Speaker 9 (00:22:15):

Good morning. Steve Whitey Camp, California Moving and Storage Association. Before I get to my comment, I can't stand at this microphone and not say that. I think there's a misconception of the economic impact of what's gone on with this program over the last year on the local agent and they are economically stressed dramatically. If you had been to A-P-P-F-A few years ago when we used to do these physically, there was a lot more agents in the room. I have very few agents here. I represent about 400 agents in California. Very few of them are able to attend. They provide service every day to this program but are struggling quite a bit. The issue I want to talk about right here is the commercial packing standards. I think the government has a misconception that because they're one of the biggest accounts, they don't get the same quality of service as a Boeing or some other national account.

(00:23:16):

And I will tell you that is an inaccurate perception. That is not correct. In fact, when you talk about commercial packing standards, there is no higher standard than the standard that you have already established. That is the highest standard in our industry. I would tell you that commercial packing standards are an economic negotiation on a case by case basis and sometimes that's very dynamic. So I would tell you that you can feel confident that the standard you have, well maybe there needs some policing in certain areas. The standard you have is the gold standard for packing.

Speaker 10 (00:24:05):

Good morning, Tim Lenthall with National Van Lines. I will ditto Steve's comments about the economic conditions for our agents. When I think about what can we do to, I think about the data collection that we make right now on customer satisfaction surveys and the current, we know it's a low response rate.

We know that we've made child work graded through best value scoring system. One of the best ways we could improve the program would be to get more customer satisfaction response customers to really get some good data standards in there. I don't have them, I don't think the awarding of mean scores to individual TSPs statistically valid. So I don't think you're getting accurate measurements. You could validate that by looking at the TSPs that are in your top 20. Every distribution or allocation cycle they change every time. Probably should be more consistent if you're accurately measure quality.

(00:25:06):

But what happens is we've created a feast or famine model where we have outliers on their score and they get a bunch of shipments and eventually they revert to the mean. That's just math. So if we could do a better job about getting customer satisfaction scores in and using that to let the industry compete against each other, what's going to drive customer satisfaction improvement? When I know that if I provide better service for my customer, I'm going to get more opportunities to do more work that's going to stabilize my supply chain. So it's that predictability and stability and work that most of us are looking for in this industry. And I want to make a comment too about the innovative practices. We have been held back through the regulations. There are hundreds of pages of ready to tell us how to do specific things, not only even not only the inventories, but up until a few years ago, we couldn't use anything other than government approved type two lift vans, move furniture or have a professional van operator on the shipment that keeps us from innovating.

(00:26:14):

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One of the big things about the GHC that I think everybody liked on the government side was the idea of an app. If I showed up today at a customer's house in the current program with an app and told them they had to download it, I'd probably get suspended for doing that. But that's the innovation caps that we've had on us. So we need to roll back some of these regulations and allow the industry to innovate and allow us to compete against each other and then to reward those that do a good job with more opportunities.

Speaker 11 (00:26:46):

Hi, my name's Al Crawford with Gerald moving here in Belleville, Illinois. I am an agent and the thing that hit me when you first brought up the first screen, when you highlighted the bold part that says doing it for the service member. Yes. And that's what we want to do. And I think your system should be from the service member up, make it easier for the service member to receive their goods, do what they need to do to understand how the system works at the location. If we're going to do it all electronically, then we've got to make a system where you walk in with the customer, et cetera. The old system, GHC, and I only did one shipment with them, but here's what I was told. We had to click on it and say we delivered the shipment. Now that's why I specifically told there was no checking off the shipment or anything like that. Same way with when you put into storage. I knew there's a system out there to do it, but think of the ground up, what you want, the information you want the customer to have. Go from there. That's my thoughts.

Speaker 12 (00:28:10):

Morning everyone. My name's Chris Hughes. I am with Mover Specialty Service. We're the guys on the other side of the fence where the grass is always greener. We provide nationwide service and creating relocation industry across the United States, Alaska and Hawaii. So longstanding practice has been Transcom recognizes certain services. We perform like a three piece slate, pool table, grandfather crs always authorized. Many of our partners in the room here today utilize our services. What Transcom may not know is that we provide 25,000 DP three assignments per year to my company alone. And we have some competitors that are also, well, you don't know this because I think the cost to bear those services is borne out by the carriers in the room. And I understand that when tariff filing happens every year, the word has always been just floated into your tariff to cover those costs.

(00:29:13):

Well, I think that's a mistake because you can't project what the actual third party services are going to be, especially the way things have changed in service members' homes. Now people hire in treadmills, elliptical exercise equipment that we see 50 times a week by service provider. We have over 220 primary providers and thousands of contractors we utilize on a regular basis for out of the normal third party services. So I think it would behoove Transcom to take a hard look at this and authorize these services so that the carriers in the room don't bear the cost of that. And from my point of view, I've been with the company 42 years prior to that, I was an owner operator and I hauled a lot of military in the eighties. I knew what it took to make a service member happy. We took care of the customer.

(00:30:02):

And in this day and age, with the quality of the goods that are in the homes these days, I think it's going to result in definite service improvement to include us. Definitely claims reduction and prevention. Cost of a cut cable on a treadmill could be $2,000 out pocket for someone when they can't find the correct wiring harness to treadmill. Our technicians are skilled at preparing these items for transit and handling and the reassembly at destination. We perform all kinds of different things that you can't expect these https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1606.17 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1690.98 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1753.11 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1802.47 move crews to depth at. Finally, this is an existing commercial practice and national account and to the life of me, I don't know why this isn't mirrored in the service member's experience. So it's kind of been schlop off. You guys take care of it and hope for the best. My point is let's not hope anymore get down to brass tax and include the third party services as a viable and integral part of all the relocation processes. Now, not every move is going to need third party service on it. We all know this, but we're alone doing 25,000 DP three assignments a year. So I respectfully submit half of the industry

Speaker 13 (00:31:26):

One follow-up question for the group. So acknowledge the example on the digital inventories. We're looking for some additional examples of how the regulatory structure, particularly the NG 400 tariff and the associated rule set affects industry's ability to innovate and what could we change?

Speaker 14 (00:31:49):

Well, hi, I'm Georgia Engel with Trellis Spine Consulting and let me address that first, sir. There was industry innovation with the digital technology, but with the rules that were there, it literally said you cannot use a digital inventory, electronic inventory. Let's not talk about digital where it's just an upload.

It was electronic inventory, then it changed to, well, we'll kind of let it come in. So I think that that's the type of stuff that there were rules put in place in all of these aspects, whether it's a packing or whether it's technology that hindered the industry from actually doing what we do on the regular basis in the commercial practice. So to lead into that is the technology part. So you have in this room van lines who work together with their own van line agents and that's how it works essentially in the commercial practice.

(00:33:00):

You also have independent agents. Now the van lines, they're going to talk together with their technology on each of their different van lines and the independents, well, they're just kind of out there.

They've got some other technology, but it doesn't always connect to each other. And that is where I think when you were looking at the technology piece before with a single source, it was supposed to be where there was communication across the board. So it's not an answer for you. It's a challenge with our industry that we have to speak together with our technology and it has to communicate both ways efficiently with the government system.

Speaker 5 (00:33:56):

ODed, carme, DM band lens again, and I'll address your question directly. So in terms of practices and the way the government gets involved and restrict us, it's not limited to technology. We're all in the logistics industry and so our job is to get things from point A to point B in the most efficient way.

Sometimes the government wants to have oversight on that and make it less efficient. I'll give you a couple examples of that. I've got locations in Massachusetts, Virginia, and Florida. And let's say during peak season, I have a hundred shipments that need to go from Massachusetts to Florida, right? 50 of those shipments aren't going to be delivered until September. Well, another 50 needs to be delivered immediately. Well me, I'm going to triage my capacity if left alone, right? I'd send those 50 shipments down in Florida, maybe keep 50 of those shipments to Massachusetts to be brought down later.

(00:34:47):

But in many cases, the government doesn't want origin SIT, right? They want all those shipments treated the same. They want all the shipments moved to destination immediately. And to me, I might get punitive action whether I move one of those shipments that needs to be delivered or one of those https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1886.44 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1909.09 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=1980.83 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2036.76 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2087.63 shipments that need to be in storage. So the government has established rules. This program has rules about when a ship needs to be picked up, when a ship needs to be delivered by, whether it's out of storage and transit or direct and the penalties, then convenience claims that the service member gets and what we're charged back. So with the exception of that, let us triage our capacity, let us do our work of getting the shipments from point A to point B. Look, there could be unique situations, right? As an independent agency, let's say I have five locations.

(00:35:31):

If my storage facility in Florida is completely at capacity and I have to send it to a storage facility in Alabama, when the shipment's going to Florida, the government's going to say, oh my God, what are you doing? Right? But hey, look, if I pick it on time and deliver it on time, then it shouldn't matter to the government how I got it there or what direction it went through. So again, we are in the logistics industry. You guys have set up rules that tell us whether we pass or fail. Let us now operate within those rules and without interfering with how we move the shipments from point A to point B. Thanks

Speaker 7 (00:36:15):

Steve McKenna and Ally Dan Lines, just adding to the list of opportunities, the movement of data between the moving companies and vast array of companies that support port the functions. Moving data between Transcom or the government and back and forth was always a promise, a vision at the top of the hill kind of thing to allow us to be efficient in our operations, sharing compliant data back and forth with our client with the government. That was another obstacle for potential innovation that we could not, we had to maintain legacy systems and legacy processes because we didn't have that ability to be efficient in the movement of data and information with the customer.

Speaker 13 (00:37:14):

Could you give us an example of how maybe one of your large corporate accounts passes data between you and that corporate account versus how we do it on the government side?

Speaker 7 (00:37:23):

Sure. Yeah. It goes way back right into the EDI days in the early days of data transfer. But we share billing information, we share invoicing with clients, we share customer satisfaction information back and forth into client systems. Obviously the large clients, maybe even the RMCs or relocation management companies are demanding that because of opportunities to improve efficiency, share the information equally compliantly, so then you can make decisions about performance and about new opportunities to address a problem. That particular customer might. Thank you. Thank you, sorry. Get a little passionate about this stuff. There are array of business operations here, right? With a lot of capabilities even for the smaller folks. And there are systems and technologies that are available in this industry that are really solid, but they vary and you need that customer facing that's consistent throughout your entire enterprise. But you need the supplier to be able to feed in compliant data based on their capabilities.

You need to meet them where they are so you can have that opportunity to encourage the array of businesses or support your efforts.

Speaker 15 (00:39:04):

One question I have, the business rules keeps coming up and I'm just curious what other government business rules that are in place that are also hindering innovation from your end. So if anybody has any comments that'd appreciate to hear that https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=0 https://www.rev.com/ https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2131.61 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2175.6 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2234.25 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2243.58 https://www.rev.com/app/transcript/Njg5YmVhYjU1MjM3MTQ1ZGZiOGYxMGZiSVFJY09CTkVPbFUt/o/VEMwNzg2OTE4MDY2?ts=2344.42

Speaker 16 (00:39:19):

Love Joy Republic moving in storage. You had asked about other ways that we might be hindered from innovating back in, I believe it was 2012, 2013 took me about a year to get permission to do virtual surveys for our members. It wasn't easy. I was threatened twice with suspension, but it's a great service for the member because they don't have to have a stranger in their home. They don't have exposure to the kids, all those. So I think that would be one of the examples where it really had us, because for me, I was the one, so it's not a third party. The other thing I was thinking is we talk about standards. We have the tender service. What we don't have today is we don't have crews that learn from a tender of service.

We have crews that learn from you. And if we had a training guide published by TRANSCOM of the way you want it done, it would be easier to our crews that way. For what it's worth, Speaker 17 (00:40:28):

Sorry I'm a little short Katie with Movers for America. So I just wanted to address the differences between the business rules and the way that TRANSCOM has historically done them compared to say F- M-C-S-A who handles regulations on a commercial moving side. So when industry is looking to make a change with just commercial rules that F-M-C-S-A has oversight of, they will publish a rule that is public industry has the ability to file comments if industry also has the ability to ask for exemptions to things.

So there's a lot of companies in here that are making advancements in technology and if the regulations are not keeping par with the advancements in technology, you have the ability to ask for an exemption and you can prove your technology and show why it works and then they can assess based on that and a company can be granted an exemption to further their technological advances.

(00:41:26):

That does not happen with the DP three program. Transcom sends out a comment matrix once a year, industry and associations will fill it out, send it back, but nothing is public. So no one actually sees, okay, what are the comments to these? What are people saying? And we don't get feedback back from Transcom on why a business rule was accepted or rejected. So we're kind of in the dark on where transcom, what you're really looking for because we're not getting any feedback. And I think if Transcom wants to take a look at all these innovative practices, which does vary by everybody in this room, I mean everybody has different capabilities and are innovating at different speed. Transcom really should look at having a way for companies to have the ability to submit technology that maybe it's not currently in the business rules, but for at least you to evaluate it and see if it is going to bring a net positive for the service members so that companies are allowed to do that.

(00:42:27):

Because by the time if you're waiting for all of industry to adopt a new technology at the same time, that's just not going to happen. And then by the time that does happen, quite frankly, industry is probably on to the next big thing. So I would definitely encourage you to find a little maybe a more transparent way to handle business rules. So industry's getting feedback and also look at some type of exemption process so that as industry is innovating, they can do that in real time instead of having to wait for either once a year or having to wait for the rest of industry. Thank you.

Speaker 13 (00:43:06):

Thank you. One more follow-up question just for the larger group. So on the other end of the spectrum, we all love moving towards a better technological solution, but will we freeze out smaller carriers if we mandate things like electronic inventory, interested to get the sense from the group on the thinking on how the small carriers might be affected by such technology?

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Speaker 10 (00:43:37):

Also with national band lines, I'll attempt to that as a small fan line, we're the smallest of the band lines that has an agent network throughout the country. If we knew what that standard was for the inventories, we can adopt it from an innovation standpoint, it's kind of threw me down a different path than I was going. We are in a position where over the last six years we operate as an asset provider. We have drivers, we have agents, and we also operate as a move manager. So for the last six years I've been on the precipice of being fired as a move manager. So there's been this global household, a good contract kind of out there that's going to be the single move manager. So I haven't been able to innovate at all or I won't innovate at all getting fired. So it goes back to stability.

(00:44:32):

So that's the idea. If we had some stability and predictability that allows us to make innovations and do that kind of thing. But we talk a lot about technological innovations. A lot of this has been technology, but I think there's some other areas where there's opportunities to innovate. There's not a lot opportunities to innovate and how you pack a box or how you carry a couch up the stairs. It's how we arrange all the different suppliers that we have represented throughout this room and various combinations to provide that service to the customer. And so one of the things, and I keep referring everything to the current program, so grounded in have been in it for so long, and I guess maybe a question to ask, I don't know if you can answer it, is whether or not you are planning on moving down the road of going to the far base contract with a single source again or if there's an opportunity to go with some other program that's maybe based on the current Tinder, because the Tinder program is stable, so we know that it's able to absorb a large amount of volume quickly and we had a pretty successful summer.

(00:45:42):

I think we've had good customer satisfaction for a while, not almost 90% according to your own statistics. So whether or not that might help inform our ideas on what to give you, if you have any statement on that or if you're able to say kind of which way you're going or if everything's on the table, Speaker 13 (00:46:05):

Everything is still on the table at this point and what we're really trying to do is understand the industry better here. So your input framed by that.

Speaker 10 (00:46:17):

So on the other innovative piece, so where are the opportunities for us to innovate? It's how we combine first mile, middle mile, last mile. I think those are the opportunities for innovate on Middle Mile. A lot of this in your Code two program, which is where we show up with a lift van at the residence, seal it at the residence and deliver it to the customer at destination unseal the crate right there in front of them. Most carriers utilize a freight network for that. Currently we're in this process with the existing transcom about identifying who the underlying freight broker is or who the underlying carrier is and this freight brokerage arrangement. And a lot of that comes into from the F-M-C-S-A rules. There's F-M-F-M- C-S-A consumer protection rules on double brokering. It doesn't have an application in this program because we are responsible for the shipment no matter what happens, if my name's on the government bill of lading, I'm a hundred percent responsible for that shipment. So it's not protecting the consumer.

So those are the areas where we get into some of this. There are rules that are being made that we're not sure and understand why they're being made and how they're helping add value to our customer.

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Speaker 18 (00:47:36):

Good morning, Lacey Breakfield with Coleman Worldwide Moving. A couple of things I want to point out here on technology is we've talked a lot about electronic inventories. Shipment tracking is another area that a lot of us already do and just customer communication. And one thing I would encourage you on is don't push us into a box. We have to buy one single program. A lot of us already have this technology available to us. We're already buying it off the shelf. It's no different than if you go to two different coffee companies today, you go to Starbucks, you've got your Starbucks app, or if you go to Mocha Joe's Coffee, you've got your Mocha Joe app, right? And that's how you order it through. Don't put us in a situation where we have to go to one service provider for us all to be a part of it and that we can then give our app to the customer. They can operate on that and they can have all that information to them and it's an inexpensive way to communicate with a customer, Speaker 8 (00:48:30):

Sir. So appreciate that. On that topic, if you could or anyone else in the room could elaborate on maybe some of the technology that's out there for shipment tracking, because one of the common themes we've talked about thus far is parent. It keeps a couple of ways. So for a service member's perspective, great to have some more transparency regarding location and status of shipment. So if you could maybe speak to some of the apps or programs you're using right now to enable that.

Speaker 18 (00:48:57):

Yeah, one, I'm…