OceanSchedules.com Help
Version 6.0.46
Contents
1.
Getting Started ...................................................................................................................... 2
1.1.
The Home Page (query screen)....................................................................................... 2
1.2.
The Results Page............................................................................................................. 3
1.2.1.
1.2.2.
1.2.3.
1.2.4.
1.2.5.
1.2.6.
Schedules Manager™ ............................................................................................................................5
Column Sorting......................................................................................................................................5
Information Button ................................................................................................................................5
Contact Carrier Button...........................................................................................................................6
Book Now Button ..................................................................................................................................7
Download Schedules Button................................................................................................................10
1.3.
Preferences.................................................................................................................... 10
1.4.
Carrier Coverage Screen ............................................................................................... 11
1.5.
Site Map ........................................................................................................................ 12
2. Information for INTTRA-Act Users ................................................................................. 13
2.1.
Accessing OceanSchedules from INTTRA-Act ........................................................... 13
2.2.
Passing data from OceanSchedules to Booking............................................................ 15
3. Technical Information ........................................................................................................ 16
3.1.
Browsers ....................................................................................................................... 16
3.1.1.
3.1.2.
3.1.3.
3.2.
3.3.
3.4.
3.4.1.
4.
Approved Browsers .............................................................................................................................16
Other Browsers ....................................................................................................................................16
Browsers with Known Problems .........................................................................................................17
Operating Systems ........................................................................................................ 17
Hardware Requirements................................................................................................ 17
Configuration Requirements......................................................................................... 17
Cookies ................................................................................................................................................17
3.5.
Security Information (http and https)............................................................................ 17
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s) ............................................................................... 18
4.1.
Home Page Questions ................................................................................................... 18
4.1.1.
4.1.2.
4.1.3.
4.1.4.
4.2.
4.2.1.
4.2.2.
4.2.3.
4.3.
4.3.1.
4.4.
4.4.1.
4.4.2.
4.5.
4.5.1.
4.5.2.
4.5.3.
4.6.
What is the difference between “Port to port” and “Point to Point”? ..................................................18
What are some shortcuts for date entry? ..............................................................................................18
What are implications of using the “Weeks out” field? .......................................................................18
Why do 2 orange rectangles saying “OceanSchedules.com” flash on the screen? ..............................18
Results Page Questions ................................................................................................. 18
How does surrounding ports work? .....................................................................................................18
Why are some Contact-Carrier and Book-Now buttons turned off?....................................................19
Why do some carriers show time on their sailings?.............................................................................20
Preferences Questions................................................................................................... 20
Why is the list of carriers different than in Carrier Coverage? ............................................................20
Registration Questions .................................................................................................. 20
What does OceanSchedules.com do with my registration information?..............................................20
Do I have to register?...........................................................................................................................20
Login & Logout Questions ........................................................................................... 20
Do I need to logout?.............................................................................................................................20
What benefits are there to staying logged in? ......................................................................................21
What risks are there to staying logged in? ...........................................................................................21
Carrier Coverage Questions.......................................................................................... 21
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4.6.1.
4.6.2.
4.7.
What carriers provide data to OceanSchedules.com? ..........................................................................21
How complete is the carrier coverage on OceanSchedules.com? ........................................................22
Schedule Data Questions .............................................................................................. 22
4.7.1.
4.7.2.
4.7.3.
4.7.4.
4.7.5.
4.7.6.
4.8.
How does the data get to OceanSchedules.com? .................................................................................22
How often is it updated? ......................................................................................................................22
How far in the future does it go? .........................................................................................................22
Does the system include transshipment information?..........................................................................23
What vessel is the vessel on the Info popup?.......................................................................................23
Does OceanSchedules.com include all carrier sailings? ......................................................................23
Advertising Targeting Questions .................................................................................. 23
4.8.1.
4.8.2.
4.8.3.
Why do some ads repeat? ....................................................................................................................23
Why does the Back Button cause ads to change? ................................................................................23
Why do the text ads at the bottom of the Results page change? ..........................................................23
5.
Advertiser Information ...................................................................................................... 24
5.1.
How do I check ad performance? ................................................................................. 24
5.2.
How do I get a User ID and password? ........................................................................ 24
5.3.
How do I test ads?......................................................................................................... 24
5.4.
Where should I send the user when they click on my ad? ............................................ 25
6. Carrier Information............................................................................................................ 25
6.1.
Carriers providing schedules to OceanSchedules.com ................................................. 25
6.1.1.
6.1.2.
6.2.
How good is my data quality? .............................................................................................................25
How do I measure the interest in my schedules? .................................................................................25
Carriers not yet providing schedules to OceanSchedules.com ..................................... 25
6.2.1.
How can I send schedules data to OceanSchedules.com .....................................................................25
1. Getting Started
1.1.
The Home Page (query screen)
The home page for OceanSchedules.com is the screen on which the user enters a schedules query
(see Figure 1). To query sailing schedules, simply type in an origin and destination (using
English names for locations) and hit <Get Schedules>. You can use the default values for all
other fields.
The system will query all schedules data for the entered origin/destination pair that is in the
OceanSchedules.com database. It will only display records that have the departure date (or
arrival date, if you selected that radio button) between the date specified in the <Date> field and
a date ‘x’ weeks in the future where ‘x’ is the number of weeks specified in the <Weeks Out>
field.
You will then be automatically brought to the Results Page to review the answer to your query.
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Figure 1. The Home Page (Query Screen)
1.2.
The Results Page
The results page displays the answers to your schedules query and allows you to interact with the
data (see Figure 2). The different features on the page are described in the sections that follow.
The query size depends on how many carriers have provided data to OceanSchedules.com for the
voyage you are searching and how many weeks you requested in the query. The query size and
your connection speed will determine how long the query takes to execute. Select a lower
number of weeks to reduce the query time.
If you are logged in to OceanSchedules.com (see Figure 3), the Results Page will automatically
modify the query results to filter out undesired carriers, departure days of the week and arrival
days of the week.
Figure 3. A logged-in user.
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Download
Button
Schedules
Manager
Info
Button
Carrier
Contact
Button
BookNow
Button
Figure 2. The Results Page
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1.2.1. Schedules Manager™
OceanSchedules.com provides you access to traditional schedules data and the Schedules
Manager™ allows you to interact with the data to quickly find the specific voyages of interest to
you.
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Use your mouse to drag either of the slider icons to change the date windows or the
transit-time filter.
Check or uncheck the day-of-the-week or carrier checkboxes to instantly change the
filtering of the displayed data.
Use the “display all” or “select all” hyperlinks to quickly bring back data that is filtered
out.
Use the control total at the top to see how much you have filtered out.
Transportation filtering and carrier filtering are independent, but cumulative in impact. So, you
can filter out carriers that you don’t use while also filtering in the transportation portion of the
Manager. The displayed records will be those that pass both filter criteria.
1.2.2. Column Sorting
Every column of data can be the sort column by clicking on the up or down arrow immediately
to the right of each column heading. The sort column is lightly shaded and the sort order is
indicated by highlighting the up or down arrow.
The default sort order is date (either departure or arrival, depending on the selection in the Query
screen) plus transit time (shortest to longest) plus carrier name (in alphabetical order).
1.2.3. Information Button
The “Info” button brings a popup window that provides additional information about a specific
voyage (see Figure 4). The carrier that provided the schedule can provide a small advertisement
in the right side of the popup. Clicking on that will take you to a page designated by the carrier.
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Figure 4. The Info Popup
1.2.4. Contact Carrier Button
You may be interested in a particular voyage that is operated by a carrier that is new to you. The
“Contact-Carrier” button provides a way for you to indicate to the carrier that you would like to
be contacted about a particular voyage.
The button is only ‘lit’ for carriers that have requested leads from OceanSchedules.com. If the
button is ‘lit’, when you click on it, you will see the screen shown in Figure 5. A logged-in user
will have much of the information pre-filled in; a non-logged-in user will need to fill in all the
fields.
When you hit <Submit>, OceanSchedules will send your contact information and information
about the specific voyage of interest to a pre-designated email address at the carrier. The carrier
will then follow up. OceanSchedules.com can not commit for the timeliness of carrier response
but it is likely it will take a few days for you to be contacted.
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Figure 5. The Contact-Carrier Popup
1.2.5. Book Now Button
You may wish to make a booking on a specific voyage directly from OceanSchedules.com.
This is possible through our strategic relationship with INTTRA Inc., the world’s largest portal
for ocean container shippers.
The button will be ‘lit’ only if the carrier accepts bookings via the INTTRA portal. If the carrier
does not accept bookings via INTTRA, you will need to use an alternate channel to make your
booking.
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Even if the button is ‘lit’, you will not be able to make a booking unless:
a.
b.
c.
d.
You are registered at OceanSchedules.com.
You are logged into OceanSchedules.com.
You have a login and password for INTTRA.
You are ‘registered’ with the desired carrier at INTTRA. Registration is the process
during which INTTRA makes internal configurations to allow smooth data exchange to
and from a specific carrier. Each individual carrier requires registration.
Figure 6 shows the popup window that you will see when you are asked to login to INTTRA.
Figure 6. The INTTRA Login Screen
Figure 7 shows the data that is passed by OceanSchedules.com to INTTRA’s booking
application. In addition, the carrier name is passed to the booking. You can complete the
booking and submit it just as you would with any other INTTRA booking.
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Figure 7. Data passed to the INTTRA Booking Application
If you try to make a booking with a carrier that you are not already registered with at INTTRA,
you will see the screen in Figure 8. You can work with INTTRA’s customer service group to get
registered for future use.
Figure 8. Attempting to book in INTTRA with a carrier with which you are not registered
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1.2.6. Download Schedules Button
At many times, you may want to capture the details of a schedules search for further analysis or
to email to someone else. You can accomplish this by downloading the data to an Excel file
using the ‘Download Schedules” Button.
You may only use this button if you are registered on OceanSchedules.com and you have logged
in. If you meet both of these prerequsites, hitting the <Download> button will copy all of the
records on the screen (using your current Schedules Manager™ filters) to a csv format that will
go automatically into Excel if your browser is configured to do this.
If your browser is not configured to do this, you will need to save the csv file and then open it in
Excel in a separate window.
1.3.
Preferences
Once you register on OceanSchedules.com, you are able to set preferences so that the system
saves you more time. The Preferences screen (see Figure 9) is accessible from the home page, to
the bottom left of the Search box. It also automatically follows the Registration screen when you
are registering.
The date preference control the format used when you enter a date on the search page and also
controls the display format for dates throughout the application. The 3 choices are MM-DD-YY,
DD-MM-YY and DD-MMM-YY. The default date format is DD-MMM-YY (for example, the
4th of July, 2006 would be “04-JUL-06”)
The language preference only supports English in this version. Future versions will offer a user
interface in additional languages.
Other preferences control the way that schedules data displays on the Results Screen. Each
option is described below.
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Carriers. De-select the carriers that you want to have automatically removed from the
display using the Schedules Manager™ check boxes. All carriers with their box checked
will remain on the data display. The default is to have all carriers selected.
Departure Day of the Week. De-select any day of the week that you want to have
automatically removed from the display using the Schedules Manager™ check boxes.
All days with their box checked will remain on the data display. The default is to have
all days selected.
Arrival Day of the Week. De-select any day of the week that you want to have
automatically removed from the display using the Schedules Manager™ check boxes.
All days with their box checked will remain on the data display. The default is to have
all days selected.
Show Surrounding Ports with Search Results. Click <Yes> to have the query look
for ports near the port you entered and bring those results back with the results that you
asked for. Click <No> to have the query only look for the port that you entered. The
default is <Yes>.
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Figure 9. Preferences Screen
1.4.
Carrier Coverage Screen
OceanSchedules.com has a large number of carriers that provide schedules information directly
to our databases. You can see the list of participating carriers and the date of their most recent
update on the Carrier Coverage Screen (see Figure 10). This screen is accessible from the
<About Us> menu, by selecting ‘Carrier Coverage’ from the left-side navigation menu.
The “Most Recent Schedule” column is updated whenever a carrier sends an update to
OceanSchedules.com.
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Figure 10. Carrier Coverage Screen
1.5.
Site Map
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2. Information for INTTRA-Act Users
2.1.
Accessing OceanSchedules from INTTRA-Act
INTTRA-Act users can access OceanSchedules.com directly from inside of INTTRA-Act via 3
different mechanisms. The first is on the strip menu at the top of every screen in INTTRA-Act.
The second is from the <Schedules> option on the home page (see red circles on Figure 11).
Figure 11. Access to OceanSchedules from INTTRA-Act.
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The third way to access OceanSchedules from INTTRA-Act is found on the booking page (see
Figure 12). If you type in a Load Port or Discharge Port on the INTTRA-Act screen, the system
will automatically pass the data to OceanSchedules and fill in the home page in
OceanSchedules.com. You will only need to set the date and weeks-out to the desired time
window and hit <Get Schedules> to do your query.
Figure 12. Access to OceanSchedules from the Booking page.
When you click on the <search schedules> hyperlink on the Booking page, you will see the
popup message shown in Figure 13. This message advises an occasional user that they should
not worry about being re-directed to a site with a name different than INTTRA. If you are a
regular user, you can check the <Don’t display again> checkbox to cause the message not to
recur.
The checkbox creates a cookie on your computer so the popup can be avoided. If you delete
your cookies or if you use INTTRA-Act on a different computer, you will need to re-check the
checkbox to eliminate the popup.
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Figure 13. Popup for INTTRA-Act users to tell them of redirection to OceanSchedules.com
Once in OceanSchedules.com, you should make sure you are logged into OceanSchedules so that
you will have access to all features of the schedules site. Depending on how you get to
OceanSchedules.com, the site’s automatic log-in feature must be initialized.
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If you come from the INTTRA-Act strip menu or the INTTRA-Act home page, you are
using the same login cookie as is used when you access the site via
http://www.oceanschedules.com.
When you come from INTTRA-Act Booking, you are using a different login cookie –
https://www.inttraworks.com/schedules (note that the connection uses ssl).
You can use the same login ID for each process, but the computer thinks of it as two separate
logins. This is because the url utilized when you come from INTTRA-Act Booking is different
(it is secure) than the url when you come from the INTTRA-Act menu or home page (it is not
secure).
2.2.
Passing data from OceanSchedules to Booking
If you try to send schedules data from OceanSchedules.com to INTTRA-Act by hitting the
<Book-Now> button on a voyage by a carrier for which you are not registered in INTTRA, you
will see the popup shown in Figure 14. This popup indicates that you are not configured in
INTTRA-Act to make bookings with the carrier that you just selected, even though that carrier
does accept bookings via INTTRA from other customers. Please contact INTTRA’s customer
service group to get configured for your desired carrier.
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Figure 14. Popup when user tries to create booking with a carrier for which they are not
registered
3. Technical Information
3.1.
Browsers
3.1.1. Approved Browsers
OceanSchedules.com has been tested with the following browser versions. Other browsers or
versions may not work optimally with the site. If you have problems with an unsupported
browser, please let us know at feedback@oceanschedules.com.
3.1.1.1.
Microsoft Internet Explorer, version 6.0.29
3.1.1.2.
Mozilla Firefox, version 1.5.0.8
The site should work with:
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Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 and above.
FireFox 1.0 and above.
Netscape 7.1 and above.
3.1.2. Other Browsers
OceanSchedules.com functions but has some cosmetic problems with the following browsers:
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3.1.2.1.
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Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.x
3.1.3. Browsers with Known Problems
OceanSchedules.com has been found to NOT work with the following browsers:
3.2.
3.1.3.1.
Opera for Windows
3.1.3.2.
Safari for Macintosh
Operating Systems
OceanSchedules.com does NOT work on Windows 98 machines. It should work on Windows
2000 and later operating systems.
3.3.
Hardware Requirements
The auto fill-in on the Home Page and the Schedules Manager™ on the Results page both use
new technology called AJAX. This technology places demands on the processor of the browser
that is connected to the application. Older PC’s will exhibit slower system performance.
3.4.
Configuration Requirements
3.4.1. Cookies
Cookies are not required to use OceanSchedules as a Guest (not logged in).
Your browser must be configured to allow cookies if you want to log in (to use features such as
Preferences, Download Schedules, and Book Now). The system uses a cookie to know that you
have logged in.
Cookies are required to save information regarding popup alerts when you say that the system
should not display the alert again.
3.5.
Security Information (http and https)
OceanSchedules.com can operate in http (non-secure) or https (secure) modes. Testing has
found that connecting in http (non-secure) mode produces noticeably faster user response times,
particularly in Asia and South America.
Even when the site is accessed in http (non-secure) mode, the site will automatically switch to
https mode for the following screens:
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Login
Register
My Account
After accessing one of these screens, the system will remain in https (secure) mode until you
close the browser and then re-open the browser on the non-secure site.
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When the site is running in secure mode (https), the text ads at the bottom of the Results page
will not be provided by Google.
4. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
4.1.
Home Page Questions
4.1.1. What is the difference between “Port to port” and “Point to Point”?
Setting the radio button on the Search screen to ‘Port-to-Port’ delivers the following benefits:
ƒ The auto fill-in (on origin and destination) works optimally because there are only about
800 ports in the port-to-port list while the point-to-point list contains tens of thousands of
location names (it is the complete UN Location List).
ƒ In this release, most carriers are only providing port-to-port data and are NOT providing
point-to-point schedules. A query of a location that is not a port is likely to produce no
results.
ƒ The label “beta” will be removed when more carriers are providing point-to-point data to
the system.
4.1.2. What are some shortcuts for date entry?
Dates display with a 4-digit year, but you can enter the last two digits or all four digits. For 2006,
you could enter ‘06’ or ‘2006’.
4.1.3. What are implications of using the “Weeks out” field?
The “Weeks Out” field controls how much data will be returned to the Results screen. The more
data you request, the longer the Results screen will take to display. Therefore, it is best to
request as small a number in this field as you need.
4.1.4. Why do 2 orange rectangles saying “OceanSchedules.com” flash on
the screen?
The rectangles are place-holders for the advertising content that appears later on the page. On
slower connections, the advertisements can take longer to appear than the application
functionality. In this situation, the place-holder provides the user with the perception that the
screen is ready for their use so they do not have to wait until all the ads have appeared.
4.2.
Results Page Questions
4.2.1. How does surrounding ports work?
As long as you have not set your Preferences to exclude surrounding ports, a query will
automatically look for ports that are near the ports you have entered in your query and return
results for all the sailings serving the port you initially requested and any surrounding ports of
the origin or destination (see Figure 4.2.1).
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Figure 4.2.1. Surrounding Ports
4.2.2. Why are some Contact-Carrier and Book-Now buttons turned off?
The Contact-Carrier button is only turned on when a carrier has requested this service from
OceanSchedules.com. A carrier might not request this service if they are not able to efficiently
receive an email from OceanSchedules.com at a global email address and quickly route it to the
appropriate sales person in one of their regional sales organizations.
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The Book-Now button is only turned on when a carrier accepts bookings via INTTRA. Because
OceanSchedules.com is an industry resource, it accepts schedules data from all carriers,
independent of their portal affiliation.
Please note that even if the Book-Now button is ‘lit’, you may only make a booking with that
specific carrier if you are registered at INTTRA to make bookings with the carrier.
4.2.3. Why do some carriers show time on their sailings?
OceanSchedules.com receives all its schedule data electronically from carriers. Some carriers
provide a time in their data feeds while others do not. OceanSchedules.com asks carriers to
provide a local time (in the timezone of the relevant port) with each schedule record they provide.
4.3.
Preferences Questions
4.3.1. Why is the list of carriers different than in Carrier Coverage?
The list of carriers in the Preferences screen is a list of all carriers that might provide schedules
data to OceanSchedules.com. The list of carriers on the Carrier Coverage screen only includes
carriers that are in production with their data feeds to OceanSchedules.com. Over time, the two
lists should converge but this may take a long time.
4.4.
Registration Questions
4.4.1. What does OceanSchedules.com do with my registration
information?
The OceanSchedules.com Privacy and Security Policy and Legal Terms and Conditions explain
the specific ways in which OceanSchedules.com protects your privacy.
In layman’s terms, the registration information is simply used to help us make the site more
valuable to our audience. We use the information you tell us to help us decide what new features
to build and to help us select advertising that will be most valuable to our users.
4.4.2. Do I have to register?
Registration is not necessary to use the basic features of the site. However, you can only use
Preferences, Book-Now and Download-Schedules if you have registered and logged into the site.
4.5.
Login & Logout Questions
4.5.1. Do I need to logout?
There is normally no need to logout of the site, once you have logged in. You can simply close
your browser and then reopen it again at a future time. When you reopen the browser, the
application will remember who you are and you can continue to use the features available only to
logged-in users.
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The one exception to this general rule occurs whenever you change any data in the ‘My Account’
page. You must logout and login to have the system know about the changes you have made.
Figure 4.5.1 shows the popup that reminds you that you do not need to logout of the site in
normal operations.
Figure 4.5.1. Logout alert
4.5.2. What benefits are there to staying logged in?
Staying logged in eliminates the need to log in whenever you use OceanSchedules.com. This is
exclusively a small time savings.
4.5.3. What risks are there to staying logged in?
There are no security risks to staying logged in because OceanSchedules.com does not keep a
session open for each logged-in user (instead, the architecture is called ‘stateless’).
The only complication to staying logged in might occur if more than one person shares the same
computer and they want to have different preferences or see different ads. This would be a valid
reason to have each user logout when they are finished with the site.
4.6.
Carrier Coverage Questions
4.6.1. What carriers provide data to OceanSchedules.com?
OceanSchedules.com currently is receiving data from 15 different carriers, with a number of
additional ones involved in testing their data feeds.
OceanSchedules.com invites all asset-based carriers to provide their schedules electronically to
the site. There is no charge to the carrier to host their schedules. A carrier should contact Harry
Sangree, Managing Director, at harry.sangree@oceanschedules.com for further information.
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4.6.2. How complete is the carrier coverage on OceanSchedules.com?
The carriers that provide schedules data to OceanSchedules.com represent over 60% of the
global capacity, according to statistics published by AXS-Alphaliner
(http://www.axsmarine.com/public/publicTOP100.php).
However, the mix of carriers providing schedules to OceanSchedules.com, with their
memberships in carrier alliances, provides visibility to a significantly higher portion of the
world’s scheduled container sailings (83% of the slot capacity of the top-25 carriers, according to
AXS-Alphaliner). The table below shows the current membership in major alliances, with
highlighted carriers (shading and marked with an asterisk (*) providing data to
OceanSchedules.com.
Grand Alliance
Hapag-Lloyd*
MISC*
NYK*
OOCL
New World Alliance
APL
Hyundai
MOL*
CKYH Alliance
COSCO
Hanjin**
K-Line*
Yang Ming
**Senator Lines, a subsidiary of Hanjin, provides data to OceanSchedules.com, so some Hanjin voyages are already
on the site.
The vessel sharing agreements used by each alliance often means that ships operated by a carrier
not providing data directly to OceanSchedules.com will still be visible on the site for a query.
This further expands the coverage that you have access to through OceanSchedules.com.
4.7.
Schedule Data Questions
4.7.1. How does the data get to OceanSchedules.com?
OceanSchedules.com receives data via electronic data interchange (EDI) from each carrier that
provides their schedules to the site. We accept data in the UN standard (EDIFACT IFTSAI) or
the ANSI standard (323).
OceanSchedules.com does not change the data that is received, other than to store it in our
databases. You are assured that the data is accurate because it comes straight from the carrier’s
system.
4.7.2. How often is it updated?
Carriers can send data as often as they wish. Many carriers send daily updates while some others
send with slightly less frequency.
4.7.3. How far in the future does it go?
Each carrier can determine how far in the future they want to provide their schedules.
OceanSchedules.com does not limit or regulate this aspect of the data feeds. We request that all
carriers provide data that is current at least 10 weeks from the current date.
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4.7.4. Does the system include transshipment information?
The system does not explicitly include transshipment information or details. However, the
effects of a transshipment are reflected in the transit time and arrival date for a particular voyage.
4.7.5. What vessel is the vessel on the Info popup?
The vessel that is shown on the Info popup is provided by the carrier in the data feed to
OceanSchedules.com. Each carrier has its own conventions to decide which vessel name to
show when the routing involves a multi-vessel plan.
4.7.6. Does OceanSchedules.com include all carrier sailings?
In response to any query, OceanSchedules.com will deliver all sailings found in our database.
Since the sailings are delivered directly from participating carriers, we can only provide the data
that we have. Some carriers only send a portion of all their possible routes to
OceanSchedules.com while other carriers send a larger set of data. If you find that a carrier is
missing a service that you think should be in our database, please contact us at
feedback@oceanschedules.com. We will pass your input on to the carrier so that they may
include this service (route) in future data transmissions.
Please note that OceanSchedules.com can not promise that a carrier will decide to include the
requested route information in their data feed to us.
4.8.
Advertising Targeting Questions
4.8.1. Why do some ads repeat?
OceanSchedules.com uses a sophisticated technology that selects the ads to show to each page of
the site. The ads are selected based on the actions of the user, the interests of the user (if logged
in) and the contracts with advertisers. This logic may cause you to see the same ad on multiple
visits to the site.
4.8.2. Why does the Back Button cause ads to change?
OceanSchedules.com is paid based on how many times ads were seen on the site. Hitting the
‘Back’ button causes a page refresh which causes the ad server to decide what ad it should show
at this time. This is normal behavior for the application.
4.8.3. Why do the text ads at the bottom of the Results page change?
The text ads at the bottom of the Results page (see Figure 2) are provided by Google when the
site operates in non-secure mode (http) but Google does not provide ads when the site operates in
secure (https) mode. Therefore, the site will operate differently depending on how you have
accessed it.
Google uses sophisticated logic to decide what text ads to provide. Their logic is based on your
location (country) and the OceanSchedules experience with user click-thrus on prior ads on the
site.
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5. Advertiser Information
5.1.
How do I check ad performance?
Advertisers can check the performance of their ads by going to the OceanSchedules.com ad
management application (called Open Adstream), which is hosted by a company called 24*7
RealMedia. You can get to this site from the Advertise with Us Welcome Page by clicking on
the link highlighted in Figure 5.1, below.
You will need a User ID, Password, and Account ID from OceanSchedules.com to be able to
login to the site.
Figure 5.1. How to Login to Advertising Tracking Application
5.2.
How do I get a User ID and password?
Your OceanSchedules.com sales executive will provide you with the necessary login credentials
to track results with your ads.
5.3.
How do I test ads?
OceanSchedules.com maintains a separate site to allow you to test your ads before they are
deployed to production. Your OceanSchedules.com sales executive will provide you with the url
of this site when you provide your creatives to us.
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5.4.
Where should I send the user when they click on my ad?
OceanSchedules.com recommends that you design your creatives so that they encourage the user
to click on the ad. When the user clicks, you should design the experience so that the user is
brought to a page that can convert this interest into a business action that benefits your company.
6. Carrier Information
6.1.
Carriers providing schedules to OceanSchedules.com
6.1.1. How good is my data quality?
OceanSchedules.com has a number of tools to help you evaluate the quality of the data that you
provide to the site. These are a number of reports that identify:
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Number of active schedules port pairs in the OceanSchedules.com database.
Number of active schedules legs in the OceanSchedules.com database.
For carriers that accept bookings via INTTRA, we are able to provide additional measures of
data quality including:
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Port pairs that you should provide to OceanSchedules.com to obtain additional bookings.
Comparative position of your company vis-à-vis other carriers on % coverage of port
pairs demanded by the market.
6.1.2. How do I measure the interest in my schedules?
OceanSchedules.com records every instance when a user hits the ‘Info’ button on the results
page to learn more about a specific voyage. A report of the frequency of this event and the
characteristics of the users that performed this event is available to advertisers on the site.
6.2.
Carriers not yet providing schedules to OceanSchedules.com
6.2.1. How can I send schedules data to OceanSchedules.com
All asset-based carriers are invited to provide schedules to OceanSchedules.com for posting on
the site. Please contact Harry Sangree, Managing Director of OceanSchedules.com, to discuss.
His email is harry.sangree@oceanschedules.com.
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