When the documents don't fit the business
Every transportation system ships with a set of standard reports and forms. They're a starting point. But freight companies are particular, and so are their customers. A large shipper wants its PO and BOL numbers on every invoice line. Owner-operators want to see each load, each deduction and each advance on their settlement. The CFO wants revenue by division tied to the general ledger. The bank wants financial statements in its format, on its schedule.
When the standard reports don't fit, people work around them. Billers retype invoices in a word processor. Payroll builds settlement explanations in a spreadsheet. Controllers spend the first week of every month assembling numbers by hand. Dispatch runs on a whiteboard because the screen doesn't show what they need.
Better reports remove that work, and they make your company look as professional on paper as it is on the road.
Reports and documents we build
Strong Tower has built reports and business documents for freight companies since 2008. As our original site put it, our developers "eat, sleep and breathe crystal reports, especially together with well-known transportation software." The range of work includes:
| Operational Category | Freight Business Document Examples |
|---|---|
| Financial Statements | Income statements and balance sheets by company, division or terminal, comparative and trend views, bank and lender packages. |
| Driver Pay & Settlements | Settlement statements for company drivers and owner-operators showing loads, miles, pay type, stop and detention pay, deductions, escrow, advances and year-to-date totals. |
| Invoices & Manifests | Customer-specific invoice layouts, consolidated invoices, freight bills with accessorial detail, delivery receipts, trip and load manifests. |
| Cheques & Remittances | Driver settlement, carrier pay and vendor cheques with MICR encoding and detailed remittance advice. |
| Dispatch Operations | Load boards, trip status, driver and equipment availability, on-time performance, and crossdock staging manifests. |
| Sales & Lane Analysis | Revenue by customer, salesperson, lane and period, with multi-month historical trend comparisons. |
| AR / AP Aging | Accounts receivable aging by customer and bill-to, accounts payable aging, collector worklists. |
| Costing & Profitability | Cost per mile, cost per load and net margin by lane, customer, equipment type, and terminal. |
| Safety & Compliance | Driver qualification expirations, HOS duty exceptions, inspection and DVIR follow-up, IFTA mileage summaries. |
| Rating & Fuel Audit | Tariff listings, rate audit variances, fuel surcharge checks, and manual rate override exception logs. |
| Fleet Maintenance & PM | Repair and maintenance history, PM schedules, cost per unit, and shop mechanics timeclock work orders. |
| Intermodal & Drayage | Container and chassis status, rail and port moves, Last Free Day, and per diem demurrage exposure. |
| Cargo Claims & OS&D | Over, short, and damaged cargo claims by customer, driver, terminal, and claim settlement status. |
The right tool for each report
We're tool-neutral. The goal is the right report, delivered the right way.
Crystal Reports
Many transportation systems still use Crystal Reports as their reporting and forms engine, and it remains well suited to pixel-precise business documents: invoices, settlement statements, cheques and manifests that print or email exactly the same way every time. Finding someone who knows both Crystal and freight data is getting harder. That's a niche we've served for years. We build new Crystal reports, repair broken ones after upgrades, speed up slow ones, and convert them when you change platforms.
SQL reporting
Some reports are best built directly on the database: views and stored queries that combine billing, settlements, fuel and maintenance data, then feed scheduled reports, exports or spreadsheets. SQL is also how we make sure every report pulls the same number for the same question (see SQL Data Mining & Analytics).
BI dashboards
For interactive management views, such as revenue per mile by terminal, deadhead trends, AR aging at a glance or on-time performance by customer, modern BI tools like Power BI let leaders filter and drill down on their own. We build dashboards on clean, well-defined data so the numbers match the financials.
Independent by design
Strong Tower Consulting never requires you to buy our software. Our sister company, Exspeedite, builds a TMS, and we know how reporting engines sit inside one. We build reports and documents for whatever system you run today.
Freight Reporting Engine & Document Delivery Architecture Matrix
Different transportation business documents require different technology engines. Generating an exact PDF freight invoice with embedded BOL images requires a different tool than an interactive executive KPI dashboard. Strong Tower matches each document class to its optimal architecture:
| Document Class & Requirement | Primary Recommended Engine | Data Source & Integration Method | Delivery Cadence & Distribution | Carrier Operational Benefit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Freight Invoices & Delivery Receipts Exact pixel control, customer PO barcodes, accessorial lines |
Crystal Reports / Native TMS Engine | Direct SQL relational tables with joined document imaging tables for BOL/POD attachments. | Batch nightly PDF generation, automated EDI 210 feeds, or customer portal (Pipeline). | Eliminates invoice short-pays; ensures 100% compliance with strict shipper billing guidelines. |
| Driver & Owner-Operator Settlements Line-item load pay, fuel surcharge splits, escrow deductions |
Crystal Reports / SQL Stored Procedures | Reconciled trip dispatch tables, fuel card FTP imports, and recurring escrow deduction subledgers. | Weekly automated payroll runs with secure email dispatch and direct driver mobile app access. | Eliminates driver settlement disputes; provides complete audit trail for lease deductions and advances. |
| Operational Exception & Audit Logs Unbilled delivered loads, missing PODs, rate override variances |
SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) / Direct SQL Views | Automated SQL views querying unbilled status flags and order-to-cash aging thresholds. | Automated 7:00 AM daily executive email alerts delivered to billing and dispatch supervisors. | Catches revenue leakage within 24 hours of delivery before invoices age past shipper claim limits. |
| Executive Fleet KPI Dashboards Operating ratio, revenue per total mile, deadhead %, lane yield |
Microsoft Power BI / Modern Cloud BI | Denormalized SQL reporting data mart updated via scheduled hourly differential sync. | Interactive browser and tablet dashboards with role-based divisional drill-down filters. | Gives C-suite and terminal managers instant operational pulse without slowing down transactional OLTP database. |
Business documents that do their job
Invoices, settlements and cheques aren't just reports. They're how your company gets paid and how your drivers judge whether they're being treated fairly. We design them with that in mind.
- Invoices that get paid. The references each customer requires, clear accessorial and fuel surcharge lines, POD and BOL references, and remittance details that match your cash application process. Fewer short-pays and fewer "please resend" emails.
- Settlement statements drivers trust. Every load, every mile, every pay item and every deduction, laid out so a driver or owner-operator can check it without calling payroll.
- Cheques that reconcile. Correct MICR and layout for your bank, with remittance detail that ties to the settlement or payable.
- Manifests and delivery receipts that give drivers, docks and customers what they need, in the order they need it.
I would highly recommend Strongtower Consulting to any other company that wishes to increase their Transportation Software productivity with knowledgeable, personal and professional support services.
Reports for the people who run the company
Good reporting starts with the reader. The same data serves very different people, and each needs a different view:
- Owners and executives need a short monthly picture: revenue, margin, revenue per mile, deadhead, load count and AR, by division, compared to last month and last year.
- CFOs and controllers need financial statements that tie to the general ledger, revenue and cost by division and terminal, aging, and settlement and payroll totals that reconcile.
- Operations managers need daily views of open loads, driver and equipment availability, on-time performance, and loads at risk of detention or late delivery.
- Billing and payroll need exception lists: loads delivered but not invoiced, missing paperwork, rate overrides, and settlement items that need review.
- Safety and maintenance need expiration lists for driver qualification items, inspection and DVIR follow-up, PM schedules and cost per unit.
We design each report around the decision or task it supports, so people spend less time reading and more time acting.
How a reporting project runs
- Define the need. Who reads the report, what decision or task it supports, how often it runs, and how it's delivered: printed, emailed, exported or on screen.
- Find the data. We locate every field in your TMS and accounting databases and confirm the business rules behind each number.
- Build and test. We build the report and test it against real loads, invoices and settlements, tying totals back to the system and the general ledger.
- Review and refine. You review drafts with the people who use them. We work with you until you are satisfied.
- Deploy and document. The report goes live in your system, with documentation so it can be maintained.
Our legacy promise still stands: fast turnaround, and we work with you until you are satisfied.
Report rationalization
Long-running systems collect reports the way garages collect boxes. Many carriers have hundreds of reports, half of which nobody runs and several of which give different answers to the same question. We inventory what you have, retire what's unused, consolidate duplicates, and agree on one definition for each key measure, such as revenue per mile, load count, deadhead percentage and DSO. This is especially valuable before an upgrade or migration, because every report you retire is one you don't have to rebuild (see Legacy TMS Advisory & Migration).
What you get
| Consulting Deliverable | Carrier Operational Value |
|---|---|
| Custom Reports & Documents | Invoices, settlements, cheques, statements and management reports built exactly to your operational specifications. |
| Reconciled Numbers | All report totals mathematically tested and audited against your TMS core subledgers and General Ledger. |
| Report Catalog & Inventory | A clean inventory of active business reports, detailing ownership, schedules, and retiring obsolete clutter. |
| Interactive Dashboards | Modern executive BI views built on verified SQL data views for real-time fleet visibility. |
| Technical Documentation | Underlying SQL schemas, query logic, business rules, and maintenance runbooks for every deliverable. |
Who this is for
Controllers, payroll managers, billing supervisors, operations managers and IT managers at carriers, brokerages and 3PLs, intermodal and drayage operators, and private fleets who:
- Need a new invoice or settlement layout, or a change to an existing one
- Have Crystal reports that broke after an upgrade, or nobody left who can maintain them
- Spend days each month assembling financial or operational reports by hand
- Want management dashboards they can trust
- Are preparing to migrate and need to know which reports to rebuild
Reporting often follows process work, when a redesigned workflow needs new exception reports. See how we work for how engagements are staged.
Frequently asked questions
Do you still work with Crystal Reports?
Yes. Many transportation systems still use Crystal Reports for invoices, settlement statements, cheques and management reports. We build new Crystal reports, fix and update existing ones, and convert them when you move to a newer platform.
Can you change our invoice or settlement statement layout?
Yes. Invoices, delivery receipts, manifests, settlement statements and cheques are some of the most common work we do. We match customer requirements, add the detail drivers and owner-operators ask for, and make sure the document pulls the right data every time.
Should we move from Crystal Reports to a BI tool?
It depends on the job. Printed and emailed business documents like invoices and settlements are often best left in the reporting engine your TMS supports. Interactive management dashboards are where BI tools shine. We recommend the right tool for each report rather than one tool for everything.
How quickly can you turn around a report?
We aim for fast turnaround, and we work with you until you are satisfied. Simple layout changes move quickly. Complex reports that combine data from several modules take longer, and we will give you a clear estimate up front.
Is this tied to Exspeedite software?
No. Strong Tower Consulting is independent. Our reporting work never requires buying our sister company's software. We build reports for the system you already run.
Crystal Reports is a trademark of SAP SE. Power BI is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. Strong Tower Consulting is an independent consulting firm and is not affiliated with or endorsed by SAP or Microsoft.