Industries
Since 1 July 2026 every kilometre has a price. Almost no system can say which customer paid it.
How it works today
Orders, ritten and invoicing run in the TMS. Everything the TMS never covered runs in four spreadsheets: charterinhuur, emballage balances, ZE-zone ontheffingen and a list of what each losadres does differently. The rest sits in the planner's head, including which ritten actually made money last month.
A Euro VI 40-tonne combination now pays for every kilometre it drives. That is roughly 6% on operating costs, against a sector margin of 7.11% in 2024. Passing it on takes three things at once: kilometres per rit per customer, the tariff for that vehicle's mass and CO2 class, and the right rate for the month, because the discount period moves it. The kilometres sit in the boordcomputer, the tariff in the toll provider's settlement, the invoice line in the TMS.
The chauffeur has the paper signed and the copy goes into the folder in the cab, so the document comes back when the truck does: the same evening on a day trip, Wednesday on a two-day run, next week on international work. Only then does someone match bon to rit, scan it and hang it on the dossier, and only then can the invoice go out. A CMR for international work, an AVC waybill for domestic, and a second round of uitzoekwerk whenever colli are short or a delivery was refused.
The boordcomputer knows the start and end time, the kilometres, the driving hours and who drove. The CAO Beroepsgoederenvervoer pays diensturen, wachturen, overuren, toeslagen and verblijfkosten, with different rules for eendaagse and meerdaagse ritten. Somebody bridges that by hand, days per month. PayHours and e-CAO exist purely to do that translation. A whole product category built on one gap tells you what the TMS package does not close.
A spreadsheet and the wagenparkbeheerder's memory decide, before every rit, whether this kenteken may enter that zone, whether the ontheffing still holds, and whether the chauffeur has a valid Code 95, ADR certificate and bestuurderskaart. That has to be known before the rit is assigned, not after it is driven. Keeping one chauffeur's papers current already runs to 1,702 euro direct and 3,365 euro including verletkosten, which is a lot of money to lose to a date nobody was watching.
What we build for this sector
Not a menu of products. These are the pieces that tend to pay for themselves first in this line of work.
The kilometres from the boordcomputer, the hours from the CAO calculation and the lines on the invoice all have to trace back to one record of the rit. We build the links: telematics into the TMS, TMS into AFAS or Exact, OpenTripModel or a shipper API outbound, Portbase inbound, and the toll provider's settlement into the nacalculatie.
Part of System Integrations & APIsMargin per customer, per rit, per truck and per chauffeur, with the vrachtwagenheffing allocated to the ritten that caused it. Lege kilometers, wachttijd per losadres, and what a contract actually earns since 1 July. The data already exists, scattered over the TMS, the boordcomputer, the tankpas, the toll settlement and the boekhouding. Never in one place.
Part of Dashboards & Business IntelligenceCharterinhuur and charterafrekening, emballage balances per customer, laadvensters per ontvanger, ontheffingen and expiring certificates. This is the twenty percent the package never covered. We automate it beside the TMS, on the same rit and customer numbers. That is what lets you answer a charter invoice that turns up two months later without a ritnummer, or a customer who disputes a pallet balance going back a year.
Part of Business Process AutomationShipment status, ETA from the boordcomputer's GPS, a downloadable afleverbewijs, documents per zending, order entry, and the history you need for the quarterly review with the verlader. Every call that stops is planning time back. For expediteurs and 3PL parties: dossier status, customs documents and live stock instead of a Monday morning export.
Part of Customer & Partner PortalsRit list, laad- and losopdrachten, aftekenen with a signature or a photo, reporting afwijkingen such as short colli, damage, a closed door or wachttijd, counting emballage, and times that survive the CAO calculation. Average driver age is 45.5 and 23.3% of the sector is flex or agency. Offline in a laadkuil, inside a concrete distribution centre and on the ferry deck, because that is where the signing happens.
Part of Mobile AppsAn eCMR through a recognised platform such as TransFollow or CargoLedger for the countries where it counts, and a structured photo, scan and signature flow for the rest, hung on the rit the same day. Incoming pakbonnen, losbonnen and customs documents read and matched automatically. Closing the ritdossier on the delivery day is what releases the invoice.
Part of Document & Invoice AutomationSystems we connect to
Connecting in transport is never generic. Towards a retail control tower it is OpenTripModel through Simacan, towards Transporeon something else, and Portbase is not one koppeling but a service per message type, of which you need Melding Container Achterland Road and Cargo Controller. Underneath sits the real question: what identifies a zending, your ritnummer, the verlader's ordernummer or the SSCC on the label. Get that mapping wrong and the ETA lands at the wrong losadres.
This is not an exhaustive list, and we are not a reseller for any of it. If a system has an API, a database, or an export, we can usually work with it. If it does not, we will tell you that before you spend anything.
Rules you work under
Since 1 July 2026 a truck without a working OBU from one of the six licensed dienstaanbieders may not drive at all. That is how the rules arrive in this sector: as input per rit. May this kenteken enter that zone, which tariff applies to this vehicle, may this chauffeur drive this load. Software that does not carry them produces a plan that gets fined, invoiced wrong, or turned away at the gate.
What changes
Today
The TMS handles orders, ritten and invoicing. Four spreadsheets handle the rest: charterinhuur and charter rates, emballage balances per customer, ontheffingen and certificates, and the quirks of each losadres. Chauffeurs get their ritten on the boordcomputer and sign on paper; the folders arrive when the truck does, sometimes days later. Invoicing runs about nine days behind delivery. Two customers call for status all day, which costs the planners around an hour and a half. The toll settlement arrives once a month as a single amount and lands on one grootboekrekening.
After
No new TMS. Three things beside the package. A chauffeursapp that pulls the rit list from the TMS, signs off with signature and photo, records afwijkingen and wachttijd, and hangs the afleverbewijs on the rit within minutes. A klantportaal with status, ETA from the boordcomputer's GPS, downloadable POD and order entry. And a nacalculatie layer joining kilometres from the boordcomputer, costs from the boekhouding and the toll provider's settlement into margin per rit and per customer.
The result
Invoicing starts on the day of delivery instead of nine days later. Most status calls move to the portal. And the director can see which of the fixed customers drop below cost once the heffing is allocated to their ritten.
An illustrative scenario based on how work in this sector is typically organised, not a specific client.
Questions from this sector
Keep it. We are not going to sell you a TMS and we would not be credible if we tried: Transpas, 3PL Dynamics, e-Lips, WinSped, Adaption and Modality are strong verticals and that market is well served. The question is what runs beside the package, in Excel, in WhatsApp and on paper. That is almost always the part that makes your operation different from the carrier down the road. We build there, on the rit and customer numbers your TMS already uses.
Ask what does exist instead: an API, an export file, a database view, an SFTP drop, a webhook. In practice almost every Dutch package has something. Boltrics has the DataHub. Transpas has invoice export and EDI to the ferry operators. TIMOCOM has interfaces into a TMS or ERP. Portbase does system to system, including the Scheepsbezoek API. Simacan has a Developer Portal on OpenTripModel and Webfleet has PREMIUM.connect. If there is genuinely nothing, that is information about your supplier.
It does not. eFTI obliges authorities across the EU to accept digital freight information from 9 July 2027. It does not oblige you to send it, and anyone telling you paper is banned in 2027 has not read the regulation. Two things worth knowing: a PDF of a vrachtbrief is not an eCMR, and Belgium, Italy and Austria have not ratified the protocol, so an international operation keeps a paper stream either way. Waiting for a deadline that is not coming costs you the saving already on the table.
Fair, and vervoer en opslag has the highest bankruptcy rate of any Dutch sector. So: small steps with a result at the end of each one, never a twelve month programme. The code and the data are yours, on standard technology, with the koppelingen documented, so nothing depends on us staying around. And if you run five trucks, buy a SaaS TMS at 27.50 to 85 euro a month instead. Custom work starts paying somewhere north of twenty vehicles or a second warehouse.
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Describe how the work flows now, including the parts held together by spreadsheets. We will tell you what is worth building and what is not.
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