How to properly catch thieves

It is good that the internal security of UZ exposed the anomaly and sent a signal about the abuse to the law enforcement officers, who gave the case a go. However, hunting for thieves without changing the vicious technology of freight transportation will not yield results. As long as the parameters of cargo delivery – terms and cost – depend on the decisions of the Administrative Court, abuses will be reproduced, only the participants in such cases will change.

In order to eliminate the prerequisites of abuse, it is necessary to understand the mechanics of their origin. This mechanism is the current outdated technology of the organization of cargo transportation. Unlike passenger transportation, which operates on a fixed schedule and sells the passenger a specific time of arrival, in freight transportation schedules fluctuate, deadlines are variable, and there is no responsibility for the time of arrival.

If in the passenger segment there are standardized and repeated operations, then the stages of freight transportation (loading, maneuvering, sorting, supplying locomotives, unloading “fronts”) depend on the infrastructure and coordination between participants (sender, carrier, forwarder, terminal, recipient).

Accordingly, the cost of freight transportation (unlike the fixed fare for passenger tickets) “floats” because it depends on many uncertainties. Their existence, when there may be different terms and cost of transportation for the same cargo at the same distances, creates corruption factors for the officials of the UZ.

First, these are “forks” of time and prices that depend on human decisions. It is assumed that the same shipment can reach the same distance in six or ten days, and the accruals (downtime, storage, shunting operations) depend on manual records. Where there is a “plug” and manual data entry, there is a temptation to “twist” the number. For an entire train, the difference can amount to hundreds of thousands of hryvnias.

Secondly, the railway transportation management system does not work in advance. Instead of automatically planning train movements and the allocation of locomotives, wagons and crews in advance, the system reacts to events that have already taken place and simply fulfills current requests without seeing the big picture.

Transportation participants (elevator, station, port) work separately from each other and do not exchange information in real time. So when cars are idle, someone “hangs” the idle payment on the customer-cargo owner, someone – on the railway. Everything is decided by what was written in the act.

Thirdly, freight forwarders play a significant role in this “economy of abuse”. Forwarding business also exists in developed countries. It acts as an integrator agent that organizes logistics for the client on transparent and fixed terms. It is unlikely that DHL cooperates with forwarders who can reduce the cost of sending a parcel over the phone for a fee. And Ukrainian freight forwarders just play the role of an informal “adjuster” of the speed and cost of rail freight transportation and reduce the income of UZ through the hands of its employees.

That is, freight forwarders make money from the inability of UZ technology to provide transparency, accurate deadlines and a fixed price for everyone without exception. They have no legal influence on traffic or calculations, but compete with each other not by the quality of logistics, but by the level of corruption of the employees of the UZ, whom they “serve”.

As long as this vicious “technology” exists, room for abuse will exist wherever railcars arrive and are loaded, and there will inevitably be those who will monetize its flaws. With more than 100,000 workers with salaries significantly lower than the market, it is impossible to predict who will be tempted by additional earnings.

This will stop only after the introduction of technology that will make impossible any human intervention at the stages of planning, organization, calculations of operations and their cost. This means that every decision – from the arrival of the car at the station to the final cost of transportation – must be made by an algorithm, not a functionary.

The process should become end-to-end and automated. When a shipper submits a request, the system generates a fixed arrival date and final price without human intervention. The input of data on the availability of locomotives or free fronts for unloading should be automatic through sensors and electronic systems, not through records made “by eye” or by agreement.

Thus, the “fork” between speed and price will disappear, and the functionaries and intermediary forwarders will lose a tool for corrupt earnings.

Technological transparency will force the participants in the process to act according to the same rules: when there is nothing to “twist” – there is nothing to pay extra for. This experiment can be started on pilot corridors and after a few months show the result in money and ton-kilometers. Catching thieves is a never-ending process, and changing technology to eliminate the possibility of thieves is one solution with a concrete outcome.