Why did DHL choose Conex to manage its customs operations ?

The European customs software leader has convinced France’s biggest players in international trade to adopt its solutions. Here DHL, world no.1 in transport and logistics, analyses its selection process in this interview with Patricia SIFRE, Director of Customs for DHL Freight, and the first entity of the DHL Group to have chosen CONEX.

The international network of DHL, 100% subsidiary of Deutsche Post since December 2002, links more than 220 countries thanks to the work of its 285 000 employees. This company is a real ‘heavy weight’ (weighing in at €56 billion in turnover in 2005) and whose customs clearance tools cannot afford to suffer either error or unavailability. How could such demanding requirements be met ?

A perfectly “natural” research process

“I started from nothing.” When Patricia SIFRE launched her research into existing customs software (she held the same post for the transporters DANZAS, one of the companies under the direction of Deutsche Post, now united by the denomination DHL), she had no experience of specialist software on offer. At that time, at DHL ‘in-house’ tools communicated directly with SOFI, the French customs’ interface. In order to explore the products available on the market, the new DHL Freight Director didn’t hesitate in attending forums and other trade fairs, all the time heading her own investigation. With her analysis grid based on a clear list of specifications in hand, Madame SIFRE found herself choosing CONEX very quickly.

Guideline meetings and reference studying

“DHL, customs expert, required a ‘plural’ supplier capable of operating in a range of situations with a high level of expertise. CONEX answered this requirement. But I also needed to test them from the angle of their customer service, an essential element for a logistics specialist who cannot afford any kind of interruption.” Patricia SIFRE wasted no time in questioning a certain number of equivalent customers of CONEX. The response was unanimous: the service provider had never failed in its duty of after-sales service.

At the end of 2003, CONEX became the interface for DHL Freight, deployed to face the NCTS (1) of French customs. Patricia SIFRE organised a series of preparation meetings at the head office of CONEX as well as at DHL. Alban GRUSON, founder and CEO of CONEX, attended systematically accompanied by his development manager, Yannick PICARD. The outcome of these guideline meetings was that DHL Freight took the collective decision to play the CONEX card…

Adapt to local procedures for each mode of traffic.

From this point, Patricia SIFRE and her team committed themselves to CONEX in a vast redeployment plan where training, both to learn the new procedures and to manipulate the new tools, represented a key stage for more than 50 operators all over France.

For CONEX, it meant learning about DHL’s differentiated traffic by region. “Our customs procedures vary noticeably from one location to another,” described Patricia SIFRE, “but also from one product to another. Those necessary for food stocks differ from those for other merchandise.

DELTA: Automatically transmitted electronic declarations, “paperless” customs clearance

CONEX has anchored itself even more securely to the immense DHL Group in becoming the supplier for another division of the logistics expert, DHL Global Forwarding –specialist in air and sea transport. This time, CONEX has replaced an existing supplier. For Patricia SIFRE, choosing the European leader in customs software is an example of a rational decision.

• DHL Freight’s Customs Director underlined her interlocutors’ professionalism, with a special mention for CONEX’s development manager, in admiring his great ability for flexible adaptation. .
• She pays tribute to her service provider for its vision of the customs clearance profession in the future.
• So, with the changeover to the DELTA procedure only a matter of months away, DHL Freight’s Customs Director is not at all anxious about the transition period: “I’m waiting for things to become clearer. Of course, once the date is known, the lapse of time for adaptation will be short. At the end of these two years of collaboration with CONEX, the results are so positive that I have every reason to believe the changeover will be a success.”
• If the customs clearance tool corresponded immediately to DHL Freight’s needs, it was because they were able to master the relevant procedures, thanks to training from their supplier.