Client portal — Transport & logistics
A 15,000 m² logistics platform manages stock and shipping for some thirty e-commerce and industrial shippers. Every shipper calls or writes about the same things: stock level, order status, PODs, disputes.
- Each shipper gets a walled-off access: their stocked references, their orders in preparation, their shipments with consolidated carrier status — nothing from other accounts.
- PODs and receipts land in the portal as soon as signed, indexed by order number; the shipper downloads them without touching customer service.
- A shipper spots an inventory gap: they open a claim directly on the line concerned, photos attached, and follow its handling step by step.
“Can you tell me where things stand on…” requests vanish from the customer-service phone, and the platform turns transparency into a sales argument against competing 3PLs.
Order of magnitude
- · about thirty shippers generating around 50 requests a day (status, stock, documents)
- · 5 minutes per request handled manually by customer service
- · 80% of requests answerable from data already in the WMS
In the order of 40 requests a day self-served through the portal — roughly 3 customer-service hours freed daily, and a retention argument that shows up at contract renewal.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — E-commerce
A brand with 150 active retailers and a two-person sales admin team receiving some forty emails a day — availability, net prices, order statuses, invoice duplicates.
- Monday, 7 AM: a wine shop places its restock in the portal, at its own terms, against real stock — the order is in the pipeline before the admin team arrives.
- On the road, your sales rep opens the portal in front of the client and shows what is actually available, at that specific account’s price.
- At month-end close, the retailers’ accountants download invoices and credit notes themselves — the email-duplicate ritual disappears.
Sales admin stops being a documentary switchboard and returns to its real work: disputes, launches, accounts that are growing.
Order of magnitude
- · 150 retailers, about 6 requests per month each
- · 80% concern information the portal displays live
In the order of 700 emails and calls per month that no longer need to happen — and B2B orders arriving at any hour, with no retyping.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Accounting firms
A typical firm with 300 small-business clients still collects documents by email and replays the same scene weekly: “can you resend my filing?”, “how are my accounts coming along?”, “where do I send this invoice?”.
- A tradesman photographs an invoice from his phone; it lands in his space, attached to the right financial year, without ever passing through a staff member’s inbox.
- A company director checks her accounts’ progress — documents received, work in progress, meeting date planned — instead of calling for the third time.
- On a Saturday, a client downloads his latest filing for his bank; nobody at the firm hears about it, which is exactly the point.
Document collection stops being an email negotiation, and the firm’s phone line recovers its true purpose: the conversations that actually deserve an accountant.
Order of magnitude
- · 300 clients
- · one factual request per client per quarter (progress, duplicates, document drop-off)
- · an average of 5 minutes’ handling each
About a hundred requests a month answered by the portal itself — roughly 8 hours of switchboard and secretarial time returned monthly, before even counting the effect on document collection. A conservative estimate.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Insurance brokers
2,500 policyholders in this typical firm, and an unshakeable number-one reason to call: the certificate. Number two: “where is my claim?”. Number three: “how much am I paying, again?”.
- In early September, the school-certificate wave serves itself: every parent downloads theirs whenever suits them, including at 9 PM the night before term starts.
- A policyholder checks his renewal notices and direct-debit schedule in his space, instead of calling the firm’s accounts desk to reconcile two amounts.
- At renewal time, he finds all his policies — across every insurer — in one place, with the firm as single point of contact: the overall view neither an insurer’s app nor a comparison site can offer.
The switchboard empties of mechanical requests, and the portal makes tangible what justifies a broker: being the one place that holds the policyholder’s entire protection.
Order of magnitude
- · 2,500 policyholders
- · roughly one document or factual request per policyholder per year
- · an average of 4 minutes’ handling per request
In the region of 200 requests a month absorbed by the portal — nearly 14 handling hours monthly, concentrated on the back-to-school and renewal peaks, precisely when the team saturates. An estimate, before any knock-on effect.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Real estate
Three hundred and fifty landlord clients and some forty active sellers: in this typical agency, on the 10th of the month the switchboard does only one thing — confirm the rents have arrived.
- On the 10th, every landlord checks their collections in their own space instead of calling; the monthly switchboard peak flattens by itself.
- A seller opens the feedback from the week’s five viewings — reviewed by the negotiator before publication — and understands, numbers in hand, why the price deserves a discussion.
- A tenant follows her repair request: contractor appointed, appointment set, photos of the work — three calls that never happen.
Transparency becomes a mandate-winning argument: the landlord watches their property live, the seller watches the agency work — and the team works instead of narrating it.
Order of magnitude
- · 350 landlord clients
- · roughly one factual call per landlord per month (collection, statement, works)
- · an average of 5 minutes per call
In the region of 350 monthly calls shifting to the portal — close to 30 handling hours returned each month, a full manager-week reinvested in the portfolio. An estimate before the seller effect, which comes on top.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Hotels & restaurants
A conference hotel hosts some thirty corporate events a year — and every file means dozens of email round-trips between the groups salesperson and the client’s assistant.
- The client company’s assistant updates her own rooming list up to D-3; the PMS follows, with no re-entry on the hotel side.
- The study day’s running order — timings, rooms, breaks — is approved online, every version dated and traced.
- After the event, the invoice and the statement of services await the client’s accounting department online.
The groups salesperson spends her time selling the quiet dates rather than retyping rooming lists, and billing disputes die out — everything is traced.
Order of magnitude
- · 30 events a year
- · around 40 email exchanges per file, half of them about rooming, running order and documents
In the order of 600 emails a year avoided on group files — and never again a rooming-list version lost between two inboxes.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Recruitment & staffing
A mid-size client runs some thirty of the agency’s temps across three sites every week — and its HR team spends Fridays between timesheets to approve and document requests.
- Monday, 8 AM: the HR director reviews his five open searches — shortlists, this week’s interviews, feedback pending — without calling his consultant.
- Thursday evening, late timesheet approvers get their reminder: Friday’s invoicing no longer goes out with gaps.
- For the quarterly review, the client exports the history of their placements by site and qualification themselves.
The client relationship shifts from administrative back-and-forth to staffing decisions — and Friday invoicing goes out complete, first time.
Order of magnitude
- · some thirty document requests and status updates a week handled by account managers
- · 5 minutes each, plus 1 hour of timesheet chasing on Thursdays
On the order of 3.5 hours a week returned to account managers (30 × 5 min + 1 h) — and gap-free Friday invoicing, which shows up directly in DSO.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.
Client portal — Wholesale & B2B distribution
Twelve hundred trade accounts, a five-person order desk — two of whom mostly answer “where is my order?” and resend documents.
- 9 PM: a buyer builds his monthly order with stock and net prices on screen and history one click away — the basket is waiting for the desk in the morning.
- A key account’s bookkeeper downloads the quarter’s thirty invoices for reconciliation without asking anyone. Zero emails, zero chasing.
- A backorder slips by a week: the client sees it in the tracking view, new date included — the call never happens.
The portal absorbs the questions whose answers already sit in the ERP. The order desk keeps the exceptions, the waivers and the genuine disputes.
Order of magnitude
- · around 90 requests a day for order status or documents
- · an average of 5 minutes of handling each
In the order of 7.5 hours of daily handling moves to self-service — and the month-end spike of duplicates and statements stops paralysing the desk.
Indicative estimate built on average sector assumptions — it gets recalibrated on your actual volumes during scoping.