About AMTR
Corporate Bio
American Truck & Rail Audits, Inc. was founded as an idea in 1979, became a functioning
entity in 1981 and had three name changes prior to the current name adopted in 1997.
AMTR services some of the
country's largest truck and rail shippers. We provide a variety of
third party services for companies needing to outsource (or as a backup) freight cost
control responsibilities and the associated expense.
We service 150 shipper entities that include several Fortune 500 companies. We
provide an inexpensive source of expert knowledge to assist companies in dealing with freight
cost control in the
current deregulated transportation environment.
Our specialties include Timber, Grains, Chemicals, Metals, Papers and Consumer Goods industries.
The AMTR Difference
AMTR audits many small shippers that have stayed with the paper freight bill process
for economic reasons. Over the last few years many large shippers have moved away
from the paper freight bill and manual payment process to implement electronic
handling of freight records. Large rail/truck shippers may have a half dozen different
systems that combine data into a formatted screen for use by traffic managers and
accounting personnel. The fields that fill in the blanks on a computer screen are
pulled from a multitude of raw data tables that exist in the various systems. AMTR
has discovered, while developing software, electronic tools and capabilities to audit
electronic data, that every large or small electronic system has what we refer to as “behind
the screen” errors.
“Behind the screen” errors exist in all modes of traffic handled by the
various systems. These errors cannot be identified from the formatted
screen or by programmed electronic audits used by payment firms.
Identification requires query combinations and raw data manipulation
by an experienced auditor with IT skills. Our audits identify a
surprising amount of duplicate/erroneous payment and contract compliance
errors that could never be seen by working with generic freight bill information
on a screen or recognized by checks and balances programmed into the systems by
the shipper or established in a payment firm’s automated audit system.
Most post audit firms claim to be expert rail auditors. However,
most only scratch the surface of the rail records, applying most of
their efforts to truck records where they may be competent. Most post
audit firms claim to be capable of auditing electronic data. However,
the audit of electronic records is usually limited to a search for
“true” obvious duplicate payments from payment data.
The AMTR process is an audit of our client's AP/auto pay system within
the confines of the transportation records and/or an audit of the client
rate engine as it relates to accurate reflection of the correct contract/tariff
rates and other applications agreed to in writing between the shipper and the
shipper's carriers. The depth and quality of our electronic records audit sets
us apart from all other post audit firms. We do not use “audit clerks”. The
only auditing done in our firm is by experienced auditors with IT training.
A few other post audit firms have survived deregulation and the transformation
from paper to electronic record keeping but none can produce the quality and
depth of audit work that is required to compete with American Truck &
Rail Audits, Inc.
Audit Success
The success of any audit is directly proportional to the amount of detailed
information our client is willing and/or able to provide.
More information provided by our client always means more recoveries.