What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

[otmrookie]

Hi guys,

I'm curious as to what a RateWare is and how it works with OTM? Thanks!

otmrookie

[chrisplough]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hello

RateWare is a server, written and distributed by SMC, which is used to provide costing information for LTL and Small Package freight shipping. These are usually handled by CzarLite data modules, which include standardized tariffs, which many LTL freight carriers standardize on.

Product URL:
RateWare: LTL and Small Package Pricing Management System

Once the RateWare server is installed, the data modules are loaded, and OTM is configured -- OTM makes network calls to the RateWare server to query for the tariffs.

Hope this helps.

Thanks,
Chris

[otmrookie]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi all,

Thanks again Chris for your previous response. My next question is if we are to have CzarLite in place does that mean we won't have to maintain LTL rates at all within OTM? To give you guys some background information, we have about 35-40 LTL carriers that handle most of our pool shipments throughout the U.S. and we ship to about 300-400 customer locations. Thanks for all of your help!

otmrookie

[AlejandroBarba]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi,

If by maintaining LTL rates at all within OTM, you mean uploading the base rates in OTM, the answer is no as long as there is not any new base rates. The tariff bases, as the Czar Lite, do not change over time but periodically the carriers issue a new tariff. BTW, these rates can be uploaded into OTM but it is an extremely time consuming process and I would strongly discourage its use unless that it is only for a manageable number of lanes and classes.

If you are referring to the LTL rates in OTM that specify the rate base (tariff), the discount and the absolute minimum charge, it would also depend on not having contractual changes with your carriers on the discount percentage, the minimum charge or the rate base (tariff).

Finally, we manage a large number of LTL carriers too and it has paid off keeping as many carriers as possible under the same tariff and version.

Hope this is useful,

Alejandro B.

[JayVal]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi :

I too have a question on the RateWare.

1) If we disable/Stop this RateWareServer, will OTM still be able to get the Rates ?

If Yes, what tables if will pull the data from ?

Thanks
Jay

[nick.polites]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

If you stop SMC while and you have rates that lookup NMFC classes, they will fail to build.

[selvaganeshg]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi,
We are planning to introduce another Rateware along with Czar Lite and planning to create a group which will go to look against that Rateware. So,My question is whether OTM can support two ratewares or not. If anyone has seen / implemented,Please let me know.

Thanks,
Selva

[nick.polites]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

At the present time you can only use one SMC rateware per OTM instance. It wouldn't make sense to use multiple versions since you can use multiple tariffs in each instance.

[selvaganeshg]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Thanks a lot for the reply Nick,
I am bit new to this Rateware configuration. I will tell the need for this and pls validate whether it makes sense -
I understand Czar is for Rating LTL for carriers in USA. If we need to go beyond USA geographical location and we get a Rateware pertaining to that geographical location. How to configure that?
Do we need to have a new OTM instance in that case?

Thanks
Selva

[nick.polites]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Selva,

Someone can correct me if I am wrong but I think SMC Rateware is only for North America. If there are any tariffs outside then you can just load them in the same instance and reference them in OTM. There is an entire procedure on how to configure this in OTM via the help. From an SA standpoint all you need to do is load the tariffs in SMC.

Nick

[selvaganeshg]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Ok.This clarifies most of my questions.
I have one last questions - Is that means that the Rateware also supports Canada also as you told that it supports north america?

[nick.polites]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Not sure but you can read more about it at RateWare: LTL and Small Package Pricing Management System

[pawsspeedy]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi Nick, One Question which I have is that can we configure the glog properties of each one of Load Balanced OTM instances to two different srevers where SMC3 is installed (having the same Version and the same updated data). Will OTM keep pinging one of the two SMC3 servers, and when it is down then will it automatically start pulling info from the other one. We are looking for options of having a high Availability of SMC3 servers. Any help is appreciated.

Thanks in Advance.

[nick.polites]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi Nick, One Question which I have is that can we configure the glog properties of each one of Load Balanced OTM instances to two different servers where SMC3 is installed (having the same Version and the same updated data). Will OTM keep pinging one of the two SMC3 servers, and when it is down then will it automatically start pulling info from the other one. We are looking for options of having a high Availability of SMC3 servers. Any help is appreciated.

Thanks in Advance.

No it won't (until the next call). This responsibility will fall on the Load Balancer to make sure that it takes our the SMC server from the pool if it is down. Usually it will take it down between 5 seconds by default but can be changed to say 1 second. It varies with each load balancer.

[acuartero]

Re: What is a RateWare and how does it work with OTM?

Hi,

We have two RateWare servers configured behind a hardware load balancer. Our IT dept has used both F5 and Zeus products with OTM (see BIG-IP Product Family | Products | F5 Networks , Content Compression, Health Monitoring, Resilience: Zeus Load Balancer ).

However to Nick's point I don't believe OTM will retry if one of them goes down so you could see rating errors for a few seconds until the load balancer takes the server that is down out of service.

Hope this helps.

Thanks,
Alan