Tracking Data: grant permission to selected business partners

Using the smart app or the smart API, you can now use the existing connection to your telematics system to give selected, trustworthy partners permission to access the data at your discretion and as required, saving you valuable time.

But what does that mean for your daily business?

Say a freight forwarder has been hauling freight for a food manufacturer for a long time. If the food manufacturer wants to know when, exactly, their freight will be arriving at the distribution centre, they must first contact the freight forwarder. The freight forwarder then calls the driver to ask when the freight will be arriving and shares this information with the food manufacturer. With secure tracking permission, TIMOCOM eliminates this back and forth for both transport customers and service providers, saving them both time. In the following, we will provide step by step instructions on how to create transparency and security for everyone involved.

Instructions for the service provider on granting tracking permission and for the transport customer on accessing tracking data

This is how service providers share data

As a service provider, begin by opening the tracking smart app. Then click ‘New’ under ‘Tracking granted’.

Select ‘Associate tracking permission’. The form will adjust accordingly. Here you will be informed that this will allow telematics data to be released and viewed by the transport customer. Every time telematics data is retrieved by the person with permission to access it, it is logged for you – regardless of whether it is retrieved using the smart app or smart API tracking.

Then, you as the service provider can, as usual, select as many GPS devices as you wish to share with your business partner. To do this, select the company and, if necessary, the contact person. Click on ‘Save’ to complete the process.

This is how transport customers access the data

1.) It is easy to find positional data via the tracking smart app. If you have received ‘Associate tracking permission’ as a transport customer, you can access the tracking overview via a drop down menu. You can find the menu via the list of GPS devices.

2.) In the drop down menu, all you, the transport customer, have to do is select ‘Associate tracking permissions received’. A pop-up window will remind you that a log is kept of those times that you accessed your business partner’s telematics data.

3.) Finally, the GPS sender list will be updated. Only GPS devices shared via “Associate tracking permission” are visible.

4.) If this data is no longer visible, you can use the drop down menu to switch back to a list of your own devices. You will then once again have access to your own devices (or potentially, external devices for which temporary permission has been granted).

Transport customer shipment number

To improve transparency, you, the transport customer, have the option of saving a shipment number for the transport in question. To do this, click on a device approved for access via ‘Associate tracking permission’. You will see a pop-up window for entering the shipment number. The number entered by you, the transport customer, is not checked by TIMOCOM, but will be logged for the service provider so that they can revoke permission in the event of abuse.

And if you are not interested at all in using this feature, simply tick ‘Do not show notification again’ in the pop-up window. If you, the transport customer, later decide that you do wish to save a shipment number, then delete your browser’s cookies to see the pop-up window once more.

Open data log for service providers and transport customers

You need an overview of the shipment numbers entered and the times you accessed your business partner’s telematics data?

The summary list for tracking permission granted to you allows you to download the tracking log as an excel file for every individual associate tracking permission granted. This includes a summary of individual data for every associate tracking permission granted as well as the following information: TIMOCOM ID of sender and recipient of the data, name of the GPS device, name of the permission granted, information on time and date of the query (including the shipment number, if provided by the transport customer).

Find out more about our products:

More information on Smart API tracking.
More information on the Smart Logistics System.
Find out more about the tracking smart app.