Primary Carrier Transition Quality Checklist ($50M Freight Spend)

Pre-Flight Quality Checklist (Before Any Cutover)

• Lane-level transition plan approved (waves by region/DC/customer sensitivity).
• Volume commitment assumptions validated (what "committed volume" means and how it's measured).
• Backup capacity plan defined (secondary carriers, broker coverage, escalation triggers).
• Service targets defined (on-time pickup/delivery, acceptance, claims, communication SLAs).
• Customer comms plan ready (what changes, who to call, what doesn't change).

Phased Cutover Gate (Recommended)

• Wave 1 lanes selected (low customer sensitivity, good backup coverage, clean data).
• "Stop / slow down" triggers defined (acceptance drops, late pickups spike, status gaps).
• Parallel execution plan ready (old carrier lanes maintained until Wave 1 stability proven).
• Dispatch and customer service scripts prepared (how to handle exceptions consistently).
• Executive escalation path defined for capacity or systemic service failures.

Key Risk Callouts (Primary Carrier Transitions)

Hypercare Expectations (Shipper ↔ Carrier ↔ Systems)

• Daily hypercare checkpoint (lane acceptance, late pickups, late deliveries, status gaps, claims).
• Response SLAs agreed (capacity issues, missed appointments, system failures).
• Clear ownership defined (who owns service recovery, who owns tech issues, who escalates to executives).
• Exit criteria defined (metrics, duration, sign-off process).

Long-Term Maintenance (Post-Hypercare)

• Quarterly business reviews established (service, cost, claims, communication quality).
• Lane performance monitoring active (acceptance, service, cost per lane/region).
• Continuous improvement backlog funded (small fixes prevent big service events).
• Backup carrier relationships maintained (don't let secondary carriers go cold).