Companies in MachShip are the basis by which accounts, permission, and access are separated and maintained. Below you will find instructions and explanation on how to create and edit a company if you are a freight reseller.

Should any of the fields discussed below not relate to you please navigate to the following link and it will advise how to create your company . 

What is a Company?

Companies in MachShip are assigned and hold the data related to an organization. This includes all the rates, users, consignments and manifests. 

How to navigate to the Create Company Page

• You will need to navigate to the Admin drop-down and Create Company:

Minimum information required to create a Company

Below you will find an explanation of the minimum or required fields which need to be completed to create a company in MachShip. 

1. Company Details

• Name - This is a free text field which is used to identify the organisation. This field is also sent through to the carriers on pickup requests so it is best to make this as relevant to identifying the organisation as possible. 

• Account Code - MachShip is integrated with several accounting platforms. As such the account code is utilized to match up the accounts for the two platforms. If possible ensure that these codes match. 

• Parent Company -  MachShip works on a permission tree structure where all companies branch off from the main MachShip trunk. Setting the parent company ensures the correct structure for all new companies created after and defines their level of permissions and visibility. Please see an example below. 

In the above diagram, ACME BROKER METRO VIC has the parent company ACME BROKER VIC which has the parent company ACME BROKER.

The Parent Company should be the company that has direct visibility over the consignment information which is being created. In the majority of cases, this company will be the company assigned to the user.

The Company Details can be seen below:

2. Company Customisation Options

• Add Manifest Summary to Manifest Paperwork - set to Yes, if you want the summary report of the breakdown of the item types that are on each individual consignments appended to the manifest.

• Show Manifest Summary Type Inheritable - set to Yes, if you want the entire organisation to able to access and add manifest summary.

• Email Tracking Notifications

  The Email Tracking Notifications setting allows an admin to customise how a tracking link can be sent.
  
  
  • Always Sent - Whenever there is an email entered in the delivery email text box when creating a consignment MachShip will send out the tracking email. 
  • Never Sent - The tracking email will never be sent, even when there is an email in the delivery location email text box. 
  • Prompt when Sent - Whenever a consignment is created a radio icon will appear below the email text box where a user can set if they wish to send the tracking email or not.

• Quote Total Display Type - returns the total inclusive/exclusive of Fuel and/or Tax price in a quote.

Samples:

Total Inclusive Fuel and Tax

Total Inclusive Fuel, Exclusive Tax

3. Contact Details

• Email (Used by System) - This email will be the email address which MachShip will cc on all email correspondence. This will invariably be Pickup emails but will also be the default receiver of all Posted Invoices. This will only occur if there is no invoice receiver contact created in the Company Contacts. 

• Email (Shown to Users) - The Display Email indicates the account contact. This is visible when a user clicks on the Company Logo in the top right-hand corner. 

• VAT/GST I.D, Address line 1, Address Line 2, Suburb: (Only Required if Invoicing)  - The VAT / GST I.D, Address Line 1 and Address Line 2 fields are free text fields which are used by MachShip in order to populate the invoice which is generated out of the system. The suburb field needs to match a suburb from the MachShip database. When you begin to type either a suburb or a postcode you will see that MachShip will present a list of the possible values. Select the one which is correct.
  

4. Invoice Settings

• Invoice Due Date Type - The Invoice Due Date type will allow users to set their invoice terms and it is customisable for each client. This is a required field but is only relevant if you are using the invoice component of MachShip. If you don't require the invoice component the suggestion is to set this as End of Month.
  
  The options are:
  
  
  
  
  
  Any Due Date Type which requires a date will result in a second text box appearing where the user can specify the number of days.
  
  
• Invoice Admin Fee - Admin fees will be applied per invoice which is generated. This can be set per company and is to be put in as a number, ie: there is no need to put the dollar figure. 

• Invoice Sending Type - When MachShip generates a CSV and a PDF invoice when you are looking to invoice out transport charges. The invoice sending type drop-down will allow a user to be able to specify which of these invoice options you wish to send to each client. 
  
  The options are:

5. Tracking Page Logo

In order to allow clients and brokers to brand the tracking page which can be sent out via SMS or email, MachShip will allow the uploading of a logo on the companies page. The upload page will become available as soon as the initial company information is supplied and the company is saved. 

Once you select the save button when creating the company, the screen will refresh and you will have the Upload Tracking Logo button appear. 

To upload the logo select the Upload Tracking Logo button. This will prompt the Tracking Image Upload modal to appear.

Select Add Files, select the file and select the Upload button and then select Close. This will close the modal and the image will be uploaded and appear as below: 

Advanced Settings relating to Create a Company 

You will notice that there are several cogs, flags and drop-downs on the company page which are not mentioned above. These are all customisable settings which are outlined below.

1. Company Details

• Notification Forwarding - Notifications are utilised in MachShip to notify a broker when their client requires certain actions to be completed. These include, but are not limited to - booking a pickup, cancelling a consignment and errors when manifesting. By default, notifications are set to be sent to the nearest broker for that client. Notification Forwarding will enable a user to forward these notifications to a broker which is located higher up the tree. 

• Billing Parent Company - If you have set up a company organization structure in MachShip this will enable each of the child companies to create or have created consignments against them. The default invoicing setting generates an invoice for every consignment created against a child company. This can result in multiple invoices if there were multiple child companies which may not be ideal. In order to set one invoice per organization set the  Billing Parent Company as the company, you wish to receive the invoice.

2. Company Customization Options

• Inheritable Items  - Company Items are saved shipping items which are able to be accessed when creating consignments. The flag for Inheritable Items allows an organization to create a series of saved company items against a parent company and for these items to be accessible or "inherited" by all of the children of that company. 

• Inheritable Item Types -  Item Types in MachShip are used to describe how the item will be shipped. See below the various shipping items available. Should there be any item types created specifically for that company, this flag will give any child company access.
  

• Inheritable Locations - Company Locations are saved pickup or delivery locations which are able to be accessed when creating consignments. The flag for inheritable locations allows an organization to create a series of saved company locations against a parent company and for these locations to be accessible or "inherited" by all children of that company.
  
  
• Inheritable Receiver Accounts  - Receiver Accounts are the accounts which are used to create Receiver Pays consignments. This flag allows you to create a series of saved receiver accounts against a parent company and for these accounts to be accessible or "inherited" by children of that company.
  
  
• Enable Dangerous Goods  - The transport of dangerous goods is heavily regulated. Any company that wishes to use MachShip to transport dangerous goods will need to have the flag set to be yes. When this flag is set to yes, an Emergency Contact Number is required and all users against this company will be required to agree to the MachShip End User License Agreement which confirms that a user understands the rules and regulations regarding the transport of dangerous goods.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Default Sort Order  - The sort order is the order in which carrier options are returned to a user when Quoting or using the Create Consignment method. The drop down here allows a user to configure exactly what default order they wish to use to present the carrier options.
  
  The options can be seen below. Please note, if this is left blank, the default is to present the pricing as Price (Low - High).
  

• Default Item Type - If the client will only be sending, or will regularly be sending, a particular Item Type such as a Pallet or a Carton this drop down will allow you to set this field and this can aid in cutting down the data entry required with the creation of consignments.
  
  
• Description - The description field is a free text field where a broker or parent company can maintain any information which may be specific to that client.
  
  
• Consignment Creation Type  - There are two major consignment creation types in MachShip.  Create Consignment and Quick Consignment. These pages are most efficiently used in conjunction with a particular type of client and a particular type of consignment which is created. In order to make the options to a user simpler, it is possible that the Consignment Creation Type can be used to limit a company to only have access to a particular consignment creation method.
  
  
• Consignment Carrier Selection, Default Carrier, and Default Service  - The above three flags will enable a user to customize the look and the fields on the Quick Consignment page.
   
• Carrier Selection - The carrier selection method on the Quick Consignment page is Long carrier selection, Short carrier selection or Route Options carrier selection. The long carrier selection will require a user to select the carrier, account, and service from three dropdowns on the Quick Consignment page. This will be best used when there are a large number of carrier and service options.
  
  
  
  
  
  The short carrier selection will combine the carrier, account, and service in one drop down. This works best when there are a lower number of carrier and service combinations.
  
  
  
  
  
  The Route Carrier Selection will provide the user with pricing information as they populate the consignment information on the Quick Consignment page. Users can then select the carrier option based on price

• Default Carrier and Default Service - When the company has access to a set of carrier accounts the default carrier and service dropdowns will appear. This is where you can pre-set carrier and service types for when you create a consignment.
  
  
• Default Despatch Time - When creating consignments, you can pre-set a default despatch time. Should this time be passed, the system will default to the next day at that time.
  
  
  
  
  

3. Contact Details

• Phone and Fax - These are purely utilised for record keeping they are not propagated or currently utilised in any part of the Machship system. 
  

4. Invoice Settings

• On Hold - As a default and sanity check, MachShip will, by default, put on hold, for both invoicing and reconciliation consignments, when the selling price is set to be lower than the cost price. When on hold for reconciliation a consignment cannot be automatically reconciled and requires user interaction. A consignment which is on hold for invoicing cannot be invoiced out unless the user takes it off hold.
  
  The Should Hold for Invoicing and the Should Hold for Reconciliation dropdowns will allow a user to override this functionality. These overrides give flexibility to admin teams to set up the hold however they like, but it will always apply in the case that the cost is higher than the sell 

5. Sales and Account Management Portfolios

• Sales Portfolio, Account Management Portfolio, Referral Portfolio - If there is a need for companies to be assigned sales, account management or referral representations then these can be assigned via the text fields against the company. These fields will then be populated on the Trading Report as well as in the Consignment Export allowing for ease of data collation.
  
  
• Company Tier - If you have the need to separate your clients/companies then the Company Tier dropdown can be populated. This will allow for separation within reports as well as for filtering on the various MachShip dashboards. In order to populate the Company Tier dropdown just send a list of the tiers to support@machship.com

• Impersonation Message - Impersonation in MachShip is where a user assigned to a parent company can impersonate or take on acting as one of their child companies. If it was important to make you wider organization aware of something - for example if an account is to not have freight booked on it - then utilize the impersonation message. This message will appear in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen and is not visible to the client. 

6. Notes

• Company Notes - allows you to set up and record any notes which are applicable to a company.
  
  
• Financial Notes - allows you to set up and record any financial notes which are applicable to a company.
  
  
• How to create a Note
  
  By selecting the Create Note text box the create note modal will appear (as below)

Users can fill out the text box and select if the note is to be visible to a client or not. Once you select Create Note the note will appear and have the user and created time and date set against it.