Requested a 24-hour turn on 5 pallets of seasonal endcaps, got an ASN promising “expedited” in 7–10 business days and a pickup window of TBD. Optimizing DC flow while explaining to store ops that our SLA apparently runs on lunar time — anyone else renegotiating terms with a straight face?
We turned ‘expedited’ from a mood into a metric in the MSA: sub-48-hour pick/ASN with auto credits per pallet-day late. Would your vendor bite on a 24-hour partial for top SKUs via will-call while the rest rides standard? That combo kept store ops fed and made negotiations a lot straighter.
Flip them to collect on seasonal and book your own carrier; we made a simple rule: the ASN must include a pickup appointment within 12 hours or it’s rejected, and anything not staged by 24 hours gets bumped from the promo. The ‘TBD’ window evaporates when your trailer is idling at their dock. I’d push a ‘no appointment, no ASN’ clause.
We added a “miss-and-migrate” clause: if the ASN isn’t posted within 24 hours, the PO auto-splits to a 1–2 pallet hot release we collect, and the rest reverts to standard with per‑pallet‑day credits. It killed the “TBD” limbo and gets ops something fast — triage by pallet jack; @lucas_martin87 have you tied the clock to EDI 855/ASN timestamps so the timer starts clean?