Design and Implementation of an Online Real-Time Parcel Tracking and Monitoring System (a Case Study of the Nigerian Postal Service [NIPOST])

Design and Implementation of an Online Real-Time Parcel Tracking and Monitoring System (a Case Study of the Nigerian Postal Service [NIPOST])

Chapter One

AIM AND OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

AIM

In view of the phenomenal growth in transportation industry and the trend of information technology in delivery first class service to the customer with minimal cost. This project aim to develop online and real-time transit parcel monitoring system to the NIPOST clients. Following objectives:

OBJECTIVES

To provide fastest and most reliable service to the client at all time, all days through mobile technology
To prove self-monitoring environment for the client’s parcel or freight on transit.
To ensure proper processing and dissemination of key shipping information for quick vessel turnaround.
To provide self-management and the unbending security in monitoring client’s parcels on transit
To ensure efficient management of port operations, optimal allocation and use of resources.

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

INTRODUCTION

The literature review is a critical work at the existing research that is significant to the work that is being carried out.

PARCEL TRACKING

Nelson (1990) Tracking is the process of automatically locating a point or series of points from frame to frame in a sequence, allowing the user to stabilize, track to or solve object or camera movement in the shot. The process started as one point tracking which could stabilize a shot or add matching motion to a composite.Mathew (1980) Generally a tracking system is used for the observing of persons or objects on the move and supplying a timely ordered sequence of respective location data to a model e.g.Closed-circuit television (CCTV), capable to serve for depicting the motion on a display capability.Today it involves complex 3D camera solutions and extends to optical flow the technology of tracking every pixel in a shot.

HISTORY OF TRACKING

According to Arthur(1990) Tracking was originally part of the Utility class, and a dog had to pass a separate tracking test in order to earn a United State Dollar (UD). For roughly the first ten years, tracking received one paragraph of description in the regulations, which set out the barest basics of length and age of the track. On the day of the test, the tracklayers were to walk the tracks, deposit the article, and retrace their steps to remove all but the two starting flags. By 1938, it was added that the tracklayer could not wear rubber-soled shoes, and the dog had to be on a 30-40 foot leash and work without help from the handler. By 1943, the tracklayers were required to follow the track, deposit the article, and walk directly off the course.In 1947, tracking was made a separate class, and more detail began to appear in the regulations: The tracklayers were required to wear leather-soled shoes until they deposited the article, whereupon they were to put on a pair of rubbers and walk off the course at a right angle. The article was to be a leather glove or wallet. Finally, the dog was permitted one additional chance to take the scent between the starting flags, provided he had not passed the second flag. It is obvious from the changes in the regulations that there must have been considerable discussion of how a track was to be properly laid by the tracklayer. James (2001) Tracking and advanced tracking regulations were destined eventually to swell, from the original single paragraph of description in 1936, to forty-five pages today. As early as 1947, and encouraged by Obedience Advisory Committees, the tracking fraternity to approve a more advanced type of tracking test that would test a dog’s ability to track a person over a course that had aged for at least three hours and for about twice the distance required by the Tracking Test. This advanced test, called Tracking Dog Excellent (TDX), was approved by the AKC in 1979 and became effective on March 1, 1980. The firstTracking Dog Excellent TDX dog was a Dachshund, Gretel Von BuppMurr UD, who passed the Tracking Dog Excellent Test on March 15 of that year. This dog was owned and handled by George Richards of Sun City Centre, Florida.

ADVANTAGES OF ELECTRONIC PARCEL TRACKING

Client can check online to see where their parcel is.
Client can access all their parcel information/location from the comfort of their homes simply by typing in the unique tracking number giving to them by the NIPOST agents.
Sender/Receiver can use the track number to check if the item has been delivered or not.
The NIPOST agent will receive fewer calls from the clients if they were unable to deliver their parcel as at when expected.
It also allows the company to study the routes and determine how to get the most efficient use of their vehicles and their dispatchers.

DISADVANTAGES OF ELECTRONIC PARCEL TRACKING

Client will get false update if the NIPOST drivers/dispatcher is lazy and not trustworthy.
It will be very difficult for the drivers/dispatcher to tell lies to the NIPOST admin.
For the drivers the disadvantage would be that the boss always knows where they are so no opportunities for taking care of personnel business on company time.

CHAPTER THREE

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

INTRODUCTION

The concept research design is simply referred to the specification of the relevant procedure for collection and analysis of information (data) which would help solve the research problem at hand. The success of any system development depends on its methodology adopted on carrying out the work. To develop software, one needs to put into consideration of the method that will guarantee cost and environment in collecting data in order to have a perfect result.There are several methods that can be adopted in system development, to mention few are interview, Questionnaire, document examination and personal involvement relationship.In this project, personal interview and questionnaire method of collecting data will be employed to get all required information from NIPOST (NIPOST) Nigeria office.

OVERVIEW OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM

Existing system operates manual way of monitoring client parcel or freight. Since the existing system is done manually, it is imperative that we consider critically its mode of operation and analyse them. In monitoring the movement of freight and the ship or any carrier that carried it, the use of paper form was introduced which include the bill of laden form (will be analyse later in this chapter). The bill of laden form is the most important of all the forms required. The shipper sends the bill of laden in advance of the ship to the importer. The importer takes the bill of laden to the NPA (Nigerian Port Authority) central office for details about the ship and her located berth. The importer or its agent complete the bill of laden is cross checked and compared with the ship’s manifest. After certifying the correctness of consignee documents, a blank form called the delivery order is then issued out to the importer, The consignee or its agent complete the delivery order for and returns it to the shipping company, and then the delivery order is sent to the marketing department of the Nigeria Port Authority. After, the marketing department then raises all necessary bills according to the port regulation and their payment term, customer proceeds to the bank for payment; the documents are subsequently transferred to the transit shed or delivery point, the consignee or his then proceed to the appropriate shed or delivery point. After loading, cargo pass is issued to the consignee or his agent who then proceed to Nigeria Port Authority gate for security checks and final exit. In the old system of NIPOST company service, once a parcel, any freight has been sent by the client, there is no way the client will know the position of that parcel until it get to the destination and acknowledgment message is sent from the receiver of the parcel that it has been delivered. This method poses a lot of problem to both the NIPOST clients and the company herself. Even though the company wish to feed the client back but since there is no means of doing such, both are incapacitated and everything is at the risk of the owner of parcel.

PROBLEM OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM

The feasibility study carried out on the existing system expose some of the problem faces by the NIPOST and their clients in the past. Some of those problems are enumerated below:

Poor security system: in the existing system, there is no guarantee of the parcel sent though NIPOST since the client is unable to monitor the present status of the parcel sent or freight on transit.
Poor Monitoring Service: this is one of the major problems faced in the previous method of NIPOST operation. There are no means of monitoring the parcel sent and some of parcel got lost during the transit. The worst is that if some freight cannot be delivered, since there is no proper means of contacting the owner of the freight, the owner may not able to recover his/her baggage again.
Poor Delivery service: many at times, the company faces a lot of challenges that makes them not to effectively perform their operation or to deliver effectively. Due to the inability to give good feed back to the clients on the parcel sent through them, many issue usually arise.
Poor communication system: the relationship between the mail master or parcel delivery system is for the two parties have good communication channel. The client will be yet to be satisfied until what was sent got to the target destination. Mean why, due to the system limitation in the previous method of operation. The communication is limited and consequentially affects the service delivery of NIPOST Company.

CHAPTER FOUR

SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION AND TESTING

INTRODUCTION

The system is an easy to understand package, user friendly one. It allows updating, editing record and deletion of irrelevant records. With Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, a collaboration supporting environment is easily facilitated. Collaboration sites store information that individuals and groups can collectively author, share, and revise. These sites do not need to be associated with a particular portal site collection or part of a publishing site collection. They can be stand-alone sites that are available for teams or groups of users who need to collaborate on projects or share information. For example, a team at an engineering firm might want a collaboration site to discuss current project status, assign tasks, or arrange group lunches, without publishing this internal information to the corporate intranet. Collaboration sites can be made available for searching from your portal or publishing site so that information from these sites is not lost to your organization. However, for easier data recovery and maintenance, collaboration sites should be hosted either on a separate Web application or in separate content databases in the same Web application as your portal or publishing site.

CHAPTER FIVE

SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

SUMMARY

Parcel or freight tracking system is not one, single technology. Rather, it is the convergence of several technologies that can be merged to create systems that track inventory, livestock or vehicle fleets. Similar systems can be created to deliver location-based services to wireless devices. Any location tracking or location-based service system will use one or a combination of these technologies. The system requires that a node or tag be placed on the object, animal or person being tracked. For example, the GPS receiver in a cell phone or an RFID tag on a DVD can be used to track those devices with a detection system such as GPS satellites or RFID receivers. In this research work, we critically look at how location tracking can be used to streamline supply chains and track fleets of trucks, ships and planes that carry client freight. At the of the new design, we are able Improves customer service by providing real-time delivery information, reduces operating costs by enabling your clients to enter and track orders through the Internet, reduces billing and administration costs by automatically emailing invoices and statements to clients. And finally increases dispatch and driver productivity through more efficient dispatching.The proposed system design was implemented and the following features were achieved

Automated customer management
Internet-based delivery tracking
Real-time driver management and dispatching
Automated account collections
Comprehensive reports
Automate scheduled orders

Some problems were encountered during the course of writing this project. These problems include, difficulties incurred while gathering all necessary information. Financial problem was also one of the major problems encountered. For every material needed require money e.g. browsing so as to source for information. Erratic power supply both in school and at home also hindered this project work in various ways. The non-availability of a mail server also hindered the response management system as it was only simulated in this project work. Also, the time allotted for the completion of the project wasn’t sufficient as it requires time to learn the programming tool used for the project. In spite of all these constraints, the designing and writing of a well-documented project was achieved.

CONCLUSION

Online parcel tracking dynamic web site is an emerging technology, and a computer system has revolutionized the world thereby making tasks that hitherto seems difficult easy by a click of a button. All through the project work, what has been emphasized and even over emphasized is the capabilities of a computer system i.e., its accuracy, speed and above all timeliness of information that it encompasses. As indicated in the program, result is the outcome of any activity and thus must be given the utmost care which it requires.

RECOMMENDATION

Considering all that has been discussed and analysed, I would like to emphasize that the adoption of this new system will not be regretted as it would rather be a help for building more complex design to boost operations and promote the corporate image of companies. Like the saying goes, there is nothing with advantages without disadvantages; this system may result in overhead in some application but the benefits to be derived overrides the overheads. The designed system is capable of storing needed information, analyzing them, limiting access to information for integrity purposes, but it is however recommended that the different conditions stipulated for the smooth operations of the application are strictly adhered to i.e. regular review and maintenance done etc.

SUGGESTION FOR FURTHER STUDIES:

Improvements suggested include the following:

Automated customer management
Internet-based order entry
Driver settlements and sales commissions
Automated account collections
Accounts receivable and billing
Sophisticated order rating
Automate scheduled orders
Every driver uses a mobile device that can transfer data; drivers use this device to accept orders, update status and capture customer information as required (barcode scanning, signature capture, etc.).

All order information is coordinated in the back office by a dispatcher using a web-based application where Customers can log in to a customer website to track orders, receive notifications and view invoices It is hoped that if all this can be incorporated in to a further research on this project work, it will go a long way in achieving its objectives.

REFRENCES

Arthur. R.(1990). Practice and history of parcel tracking and system
James. H.(2001). History of tracing using track codes (1^sted.) Australia, Aminolino. Available at http://www.google.com/History-of-tracking-codes-james henrymaterials.html on 04/02/2013
Matthew. R.(1980). Definition of tracking. Available at http://www.google.com/definition-of -tracking/Matthew.html on 23/10/2013
Nelson.M.(1990). Definition and meaning of tracking. Available at http://www.google.com/definition-and-meaning-of -tracking/ on 23/10/2013
OjoA.I(2014).Guidelines to a successful project work and seminar presentation.(1^st ed.) Ogitech, Igbesa. Lizmath printers.

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