When looking to set up a new account with Black Comet you will need to contact their IT department and advise them that you are looking to despatch your account through MachShip. This team can be contacted at support@gscms.com. Please CC: integrations@machship.com in your email.

Your email should be as follows:

Hi Support Team, 

I need to set up my account <insert account code> with Black Comet so that I may consign with my new FMS partner MachShip. Can you please advise what my consignment note prefix, manifest and connote range should be?

Can you please setup to have all my Status updates and POD's sent through to the MachShip FTP directory? Thank you.

They will respond with a series of documentation as attachments and the following.

Note: MACHSP is a fictitious account code you will need to set see your account code.

• Consignments, freight labels, and dispatch manifests must be numbered according to Black Comet standard numbering schemes:

Account code = Your BLACK COMET Account code (e.g. MACHSP)

Manifest Range = M + “ACCOUNT CODE” + 4 DIGIT COUNTER

Manifest Range = MMACHSP 0001 – MMACHSP9999

Connote range = “ACCOUNT CODE” + 5 DIGIT COUNTER

Connote range = MACHSP 00001 – MACHSP99999

Serial Range = S + “CONNOTE NUMBER” + 3 DIGIT COUNTER

Serial Range = SMACHSP00001001 – SMACHSP99999999

• Data must be generated in the format described in the attached document.

• Supporting document printouts (consignment, item label, and dispatch manifest) based on Black Comet standard format (attached) must be generated for relevant data.

Do not be concerned by the documentation that is provided, MachShip is well integrated with Black Comet and you will only need to take note of the ranges that are provided as if you have an existing account as we will need to ensure we are creating unique consignment note numbers. 

The specific options for Black Comet are:

Account Code - The account code will have been provided to you when your account was set up. 

Consignment Prefix - The consignment prefix will have been provided to you on the email send above. 

Reference Pools - Reference pools are utilized by MachShip in order to maintain a count on connote, manifest, and item numbers. The reference pool will ensure that each of those numbers is unique to what we have sent to the carrier previously. More information can be obtained on reference pools here. As above Black Comet requires the creation of 2 reference pools one for the Connote and one for the Manifest number reference.

To create the reference pool select the Create Carrier Reference Pool button at the bottom of the page. 

If you are creating a new account then the reference Pools will be set to the following fields:

CONNOTE REFERENCE POOL:

Pool Name - Set one as "Black Comet Connote Pool <Account Code>" 
Minimum Value - 1
Maximum Value - 99999 (that is five 9's)
Next Value -  1
Cyclical - No

MANIFEST REFERENCE POOL:

Pool Name - Set one as "Black Comet Manifest Pool <Account Code>" 
Minimum Value - 1
Maximum Value - 99999 (that is five 9's)
Next Value -  1
Cyclical - No

 

It should appear as below and select Create Carrier Reference Pool button to create. 

Once saved, it will appear in the drop-down below:

Should you already be trading on an existing account please set the next available field as the minimum value provided on the email you received from the Black Comet support team which was outlined above. 

Test:

Once the account has been set up and all of the rates added you will need to run a test to ensure that upon go-live everything will run successfully. To do this, create a consignment - please make Reference 1 and Reference 2 and the Delivery Special Instructions as THIS IS A TEST. Once this has been created please manifest the consignment to the carrier. If you experience any issues please contact support@machship.com.

 

If you receive a successful manifest message from MachShip then please send an email to support@gscms.com and advise them that you are starting to despatch your Black Comet account through MachShip and that you would like to receive verification on the test file and permission to start to trade. Please include the labels pdf's for the manifest, connote, and items.

Advise the support team of the connote number and request that they should cancel this to ensure that you are not charged. Please CC: integrations@machship.com on this email so we can help if required. 

On confirmation from the support team that the setup is validated, you are free to begin to consign.