Logistics ERP Consultant, Australia

Import clearance and biosecurity: costs you cannot fully quote

An import into Australia passes two sets of checks: customs and biosecurity. A licensed customs broker lodges the import declaration through the government's cargo systems, and the goods may then be directed for documentary assessment, inspection, treatment such as fumigation, or cleaning if containers or packaging do not meet requirements. Each of those outcomes can bring fees, extra storage at the terminal or depot, and additional transport.

Forwarders usually quote the expected path and add a note about biosecurity costs being extra. The trouble is what happens next. Inspection and treatment charges arrive from third parties days or weeks after the event, often after the importer has already been invoiced. If no one adds them to the job and recharges them, the forwarder pays for the client's compliance.

I design a simple discipline around this:

• a biosecurity status recorded on the job when directions are received
• expected costs added as provisional charges at that moment
• a hold on final invoicing until the direction is resolved, or a supplementary invoice process
• reporting of unrecovered biosecurity costs by client and commodity

The direction itself stays in the broker's software, which is designed for it. The ERP needs the financial consequences. I capture both sides through requirements gathering with your brokers and accounts team.

Interstate linehaul bought from carriers

Australia's distances turn many import jobs into two businesses. The international leg ends at a port in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Fremantle or Adelaide, and from there the cargo heads across state lines on a truck or train to the importer's warehouse or its customers. Forwarders that do not run their own fleet buy that linehaul from carriers, often under rate agreements by lane, weight or pallet space.

Costing goes wrong when the linehaul bill arrives after month end and is posted to general freight expense instead of the job. It also goes wrong when part loads share a trailer and nobody allocates the cost between clients. The design work covers:

Accrual at billing. The agreed linehaul rate is accrued against the job when the client is invoiced, then replaced by the actual bill.

Allocation for shared loads. Consolidated interstate trailers are allocated by weight, cubic volume or pallets, using a basis operations and finance agree.

Accessorial capture. Tailgate deliveries, waiting time and remote area surcharges are recorded on the job and recharged where the client agreement allows.

Lane-level reporting then shows which interstate routes make money. Operators with their own prime movers should look at transportation ERP for fleet costing, and the Australian distribution ERP page looks at interstate freight from a distributor's side.

GST codes, BAS and pass-through amounts

GST in logistics is not one rate on every line. International freight and related services are often GST-free, while domestic transport, storage and many handling charges are generally taxable, and duty and GST paid on an importer's behalf are usually passed through rather than charged as a service. How each of your charges is treated depends on the facts and is for your tax agent to confirm.

My contribution is the system side: once decided, a treatment should apply identically every time. I list every charge code by service and leg, your tax agent sets the GST treatment for each, and the system is configured so the code carries its treatment and users cannot change it casually. Exceptions are logged for review.

This discipline matters at BAS time. If tax codes are clean at invoice level, preparing the Business Activity Statement becomes a review rather than a reconstruction. Import GST deferred or paid on clients' behalf needs its own reconciliation, which I build into the test plan. Agents and carriers billing in US dollars or other currencies also need correct Australian dollar values, so the exchange rate policy is agreed during solution design. The multi-currency ERP page covers the wider setup.

3PL warehousing billing in Australian contract logistics

Many Australian forwarders also run warehouses, and some 3PLs offer forwarding as a sideline. Contract logistics billing typically includes storage per pallet per week, inwards handling, devanning of containers by size or by carton count, outwards handling, pick and pack for e-commerce clients, labeling, returns and ad hoc labor. Rates differ by client and change at review dates.

When the WMS records activity but invoicing depends on a coordinator exporting and pricing it in a spreadsheet, revenue leaks every month and clients dispute what they cannot verify. I build a billing catalog per client: billable events, units, rates, minimums and the evidence each client expects. Then we decide where pricing happens, in the WMS or in the ERP, and keep it there.

Devanning deserves special attention because it links international jobs to warehouse revenue. A container arriving for a 3PL client may carry clearance, biosecurity, cartage and devanning charges that belong on different invoices. I make sure the job and the warehouse billing share a reference, so nothing is billed twice or not at all. For the storage side, see ERP for warehousing.

Systems, migration and working remotely

The usual Australian pattern is freight forwarding or broker software that operations depend on, Xero or MYOB for the accounts, a WMS for the warehouse and spreadsheets in the gaps. As businesses grow, add a second entity or win larger 3PL contracts, the accounting layer becomes the constraint, and the question is what should replace it and how it should connect.

I run vendor selection with scripted Australian jobs: an import with a biosecurity inspection and fumigation, an interstate part load on a shared trailer, a customs-only clearance with duty advanced, a 3PL billing run with devanning and an overseas agent statement in US dollars. The same scenarios become acceptance tests.

For migration, the priorities are open jobs with provisional charges, recoverable duty balances, open agent and carrier balances by currency, and current client rate cards. I work remotely across Australian time zones, finding the hours when Perth and the eastern states are both at their desks for live sessions, with recordings for warehouse shifts. The Australian ERP consultant page explains engagement options, the Australia hub holds market notes and the logistics ERP overview describes the job model.