Logistics · Dubai · Jebel Ali · Venture Studio
How a Jebel Ali logistics operator cut invoice-reconciliation overcharges by 6.3% in year one
6.3% recovered in carrier invoice overcharges. Customs-clearance visibility from hours to minutes.
Client: A UAE logistics operator (2,400+ shipments/month, Jebel Ali-anchored)
6.3% of last-mile spend
Carrier invoice overcharges recovered
~AED 780k in year one
from 2–4 hrs → real-time
Customs-clearance visibility
from month-end → real-time
SLA misses reported to customer
~34 hrs across 6 ops staff
Data entry hours saved per week
The challenge
- 2,400+ shipments/month across sea (Jebel Ali), air (DXB), and land routes to KSA — no single dashboard.
- 6 different last-mile carriers (Aramex, SMSA, Fetchr, iMile + 2 regional) with manual invoice reconciliation.
- Customs milestones tracked in a spreadsheet, updated by ops staff after the fact.
- SLA misses were discovered at month-end during invoice review — too late to negotiate with customers.
What we built
- Built a custom TMS with direct integrations to Dubai Trade e-Mirsal 2 for real-time customs status.
- APIs to all 6 last-mile carriers with rate-shopping, auto-booking, and invoice reconciliation.
- SLA modelling per customer contract — real-time flag when a shipment is projected to miss.
- Ops dashboard replacing the spreadsheet — cargo status, driver location, ETA, exception queue.
What actually happened
- 6.3% of last-mile carrier spend recovered as overcharges via automated invoice reconciliation (~AED 780k in year 1).
- Customs clearance visibility went from 2–4 hour ops-staff-check to real-time on the dashboard.
- SLA misses now flagged in real-time — enables customer-side proactive comms and avoids liquidated damages.
- Ops staff freed from ~34 hours/week of manual data entry — redeployed to exception handling.
Tech stack
- · Custom TMS (Node + Postgres)
- · Dubai Trade e-Mirsal 2 API
- · Aramex/SMSA/Fetchr/iMile APIs
- · AWS Middle East
- · Mapbox for routing
Timeline
5 months from discovery to full production rollout
“Off-the-shelf TMS was built for someone else's operation. This one was built for ours — every workflow matches how we actually move freight through Jebel Ali.”