UID Planning - Plan for Change

As you put together your plan to comply with UID requirements for DOD suppliers, it is a good idea to think about the future. The business you are doing now may not be the business you are doing in the future.

How will changes in your business affect your UID plan?

• More or fewer shipments, shipping containers, and parts that require UID. Think about how your planned process will scale to accommodate these changes. How much change would have to take place for you to need more or fewer resources (people, printers, barcode scanners, etc.)? What is the part of the process that will scale the least and is there a way to mitigate that lack of scalability?
• Distributing or consolidating your process steps and resources. If you are just starting with UID, perhaps you have few shipments with UID requirements. Maybe you want to keep responsibility for UID compliance with one person for now. But in the future you may want to distribute that responsibility to more people. For instance, you may later want to have one person or group submitting WAWF Receiving Reports, a second person or group packaging the parts, and a third person or group printing container labels and submitting WAWF Pack Data. Does your UID plan allow for distributing or consolidating these steps as best suits your business? You never want to be in the situation of letting your systems dictate your process.
• More or fewer requirements. Maybe you have requirements now for WAWF and UID, but not RFID. How will your plan adapt to the addition of an RFID requirement? If you primarily have RFID requirements now, how will your plan adapt to shipments that may not require RFID?
• Different parts. Different parts mean different considerations for part marking, packaging, and load configuration. If you have 1 UID part in 1 exterior container shipped with a small package carrier, you will find a very different landscape should you have to evolve to more complicated shipments, like multiple UIDs in a container, adding palletization, etc. Adding embedded UIDs also adds a new dimension to UID compliance.

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

 

 

UID & RFID Data Must be Correlated and Submitted to WAWF

For Contracts with both UID and RFID requirements, UID-marked parts are placed into RFID-marked exterior containers. And you have to keep track of which specific UID is in which specific RFID. And you can have multiple UIDs in an RFID and multiple RFIDs for a single UID and parts of multiple UIDs in multiple RFIDs. And then there are RFID pallets on which you put RFID exterior containers in which you put UID parts. It can get pretty complicated.

Once you get your shipment marked, packaged, labeled and otherwise ready for shipment, you have to tell WAWF all about your shipment hierarchy. You need a plan to correlate all that data easily and submit it in a batch transaction without typing all those long IDs.

What do we mean by "correlated data?" Here's the kind of hierarchical data that you must submit to Wide Area Workflow for a UID/RFID shipment -

Contract DLA900-89-X-1234, Shipment MPT0001

CLIN 0001, 8 EA

Pallet RFID 2F02031484C44390000000FF

Case RFID 2F12031484C4439000000100

UID D1HLD9787420000001

UID D1HLD9787420000002

Case RFID 2F12031484C4439000000101

UID D1HLD9787420000003

UID D1HLD9787420000004

Pallet RFID 2F02031484C4439000000132

Case RFID 2F12031484C4439000000103

UID D1HLD9787420000005  

UID D1HLD9787420000012

Case RFID 2F12031484C4439000000104

UID D1HLD9787420000077

UID D1HLD9787420000014

The less you have to think about all the separate elements in this list, the better off you are. Ideally, and for most suppliers this can be true, you just create your data as you print your labels and then submit the data to WAWF automatically.

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

Submit DOD UID Data - Best Practices

If you have a UID requirement on your contract, you have to get that UID data to the government. 

Which is the best road to take?

You have different options to get UID data to the UID Registry -

• The government's stated preferred method to get end-item UIDs into the UID Registry, for new acquisitions, is for you to put the UIDs on your WAWF Receiving Report. WAWF will send the UID data on over to the UID Registry.
• WAWF will presently accept end-item UIDs and first-level embedded UIDs. WAWF will accept up to 100 first-level embedded UIDs per end-item UIDs.
• Everything not account for in the above two descriptions can be submitted directly to the UID Registry.

Whether you submit UIDs through WAWF, direct to the UID Registry, or a combination, you have a choice of methods to submit the data -

• Type it into a web browser. Open Internet Explorer or your favorite web browser, log in, and start typing. And typing. And typing. Seriously, if you have small amounts of data and submit infrequently, this is a pretty simple and free way to go.
• The DOD knew from the start that typing data into a web browser would only be a viable option for a small number of suppliers. So they provided an alternative method of submitting data both to WAWF and the UID Registry-a transactional interface. That's just a computer term for putting the entire shipment together and then submitting the shipment as a single file, rather than filling in all the fields in a collection of web screens. Here's how it works:
• Use a piece of DOD-savvy software to build a transaction file with all your shipment data.
• Send the transaction file to WAWF or the UID Registry through an approved communication method. (Your software should know how to do this with just a press of a button on your part.)
• WAWF or the UID Registry posts the transaction in exactly the same manner and to the same fields as if you had typed in the data (except that you saved all that time that it would have taken you).

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

DOD UID Part Mark - What data can I use?

What's in My UID?

There are several numbering schemes that the government will allow you to use as UID data, such as VINs (vehicle identification numbers) and Aircraft Tail Numbers.

For the majority of us, we have a choice between "Type 1" and "Type 2" UIDs.

Both Type 1 and Type 2 UIDs start with an enterprise identifier (nearly always your CAGE code).

Type 1 UIDs then have a sequential counter (first UID is CAGE followed by "1", second UID is CAGE followed by "2", etc.).

CAGE + Sequential Counter

1HLD9 + 00001

1HLD9 + 00002

1HLD9 + 00003

Type 2 UIDs instead use a part number and the part's serial number.

CAGE + Part + Serial Number

1HLD9 + AGF0014 + 67GG14

1HLD9 + YTT07AA + 67GG23

1HLD9 + AGF0014 + 67GH30

If you use Type 1 UIDs you have a greater need for a "UID Data Management System" which keeps track of which UID goes with which part and serial number. These systems cost tens of thousands of dollars to start, require on-site system installers and trainers, and have hefty annual fees.

Type 2 UIDs are pretty simple because they use part numbers, which you already manage, and serial numbers, which you also probably already manage.

Our advise is for most suppliers to use Type 2 unless you find some deal-breaker that forces you to go with Type 1.

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

"Look Ma! No Typing" - WAWF Without a Web Browser

How do I get data into WAWF without opening Internet Explorer and typing in the data? Will the DOD mind if I do it this way? Will I get paid?

All good questions! From day 1 the DOD knew that using WAWF's web interface, through a web browser like Internet Explorer, would be useful mostly for suppliers with very small and infrequent shipments and for other suppliers just starting up, and that other suppliers would need a way to load data more efficiently.

So they provided an alternative method of updating WAWF-a transactional interface. That's just a computer term for putting the entire shipment together and then submitting the shipment as a single file, rather than filling in all the fields in a collection of web screens. Here's how it works:

• Use a piece of DOD-savvy software to build a transaction file with all your shipment data
• Send the transaction file to WAWF through an approved communication method (your software should know how to do this with just a press of a button)
• WAWF posts the transaction in exactly the same manner and to the same fields as if you had typed in the data (except that you saved all that time that it would have taken you)
• WAWF makes the same notifications to your customer that it would have if you had typed in the data

It all works the same way, except that you didn't have to do all that repetitive typing!

Learn more about WAWF automation in our eBook DOD Suppliers Guide.

Plan HOW to Proceed with UID Compliance

We previously published an article, "Plan WHAT To Do for UID Compliance," which discussed the questions related to WHAT you have to do to comply with the UID requirements. Once you understand and have some consensus on WHAT you have to do, you can now turn your attention to planning HOW you will comply. 

We will talk about several of these questions in more detail in upcoming blog articles, or jump to the bottom for a link to read the entire text now.

HOW will you comply?

Here are some questions to consider -

How will I mark my part? What type of part mark is appropriate for my parts?

The part mark is intended to remain on the part for the life of the part. Armored personnel carriers and integrated circuit cards in a computer server are exposed to very different environmental conditions, which require very different part marks (which vary widely in cost to mark).

What will my part mark look like?

You have to factor in the part's physical properties (composition, expected environmental conditions, and part size) and match that up against the marking requirements. Can you apply the government-preferred markings or do you need to seek an exception that allows you to apply an alternative mark?

What data will I include in the UID?

You do have some flexibility.

If you use Type 1 UIDs you have a greater need for a "UID Data Management System" which keeps track of which UID goes with which part and serial number. These systems cost tens of thousands of dollars to start, require on-site system installers and trainers, and have hefty annual fees.

Type 2 UIDs are pretty simple because they use part numbers, which you already manage, and serial numbers, which you also probably already manage.

Our advise is for most suppliers to use Type 2 unless you find some deal-breaker that forces you to go with Type 1.

How will I Register the UID data?

Do you have a requirement to register the UID data through Wide Area Workflow or will you register directly with the UID Registry? Or do you have enough embedded UIDs that you have to do both?

How will I mark the UID data on the packaging and shipping containers?

Package labels applied to containers of UID parts must have the UID barcoded on the package label, using a 2-dimensional barcode. This applies to Unit Pack, Intermediate, and Exterior Containers. No, not the same 2-dimensional barcode that is on the part, but a different format (called symbology). The reason they are different barcode formats is kind of technical, but just know that they are different. A single barcode on the box can contain data for multiple UID parts, but if they won't all fit then you must print the UID data on a sheet, sort of like the serial number sheet that we've done for years, and put it in the box.

How will you print the compliant barcode labels?

Do I have an RFID requirement? How will I keep track of the correlation between UID and RFID data? How will I submit that correlated data to Wide Area Workflow?

RFID multiplies the complexity of UID compliance.

For Contracts with both UID and RFID requirements, UID-marked parts are placed into RFID-marked exterior containers. And you have to keep track of which specific UID is in which specific RFID. And you can have multiple UIDs in an RFID, multiple RFIDs for a single UID, and parts of multiple UIDs in multiple RFIDs. And then there are RFID pallets on which you put RFID exterior containers in which you put UID parts. It can get pretty complicated.

Once you get your shipment marked, packaged, labeled and otherwise ready for shipment, you have to tell WAWF all about your shipment hierarchy. You need a plan to correlate all that data easily and submit it in a batch transaction without typing all those long IDs.

Next Steps

Once again, write down all your plans. Add the HOW details to the WHAT details that you previously circulated (from our earlier article). Pass it around again. You're just talking at this point. No money has been spent and no processes have been changed. No shipments rejected or nations ruined. Changes in your plan at this point are relatively cheap, easy, and painless.

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

 

Plan WHAT to Do for UID Compliance

Starting down the road to UID compliance requires you to answer questions in two broad areas--WHAT do I have to do to comply, and HOW will I proceed with compliance. Let's start with the WHAT...

WHAT do I have to do?

Understand the requirements. Understand how they apply to you, your contracts and your parts. Don't worry yet about HOW you will comply. Just make sure you understand WHAT you are required to do. Write it down. Pass it around internally. See if you can reach a consensus of the requirements. Give it to your customer--program management offices, inspectors, and acceptors. They are going to have to agree on the plan eventually. Why not get agreement up front? Maybe they'll help educate you on the requirements. Maybe you'll help educate them on the requirements. Neither could do any harm, could it? The WHAT part of the plan should touch these points:

Do I have a UID requirement?

Yeah, this sounds too basic. But we've seen suppliers with mere mention of a 2-Dimensional barcode in their contract assume that this means UID. If you have a UID requirement it should be clearly described in your contract, including reference to Mil-Std 130.

For which Contracts and Parts do I have a requirement?

If UID shipments are a small part of your business, you may want to make UID compliance an exception business process without affecting the majority of your process flow. If, however, UID compliance affects a large part of your contracts and parts, you may want to look at a more mainstream process change.

Do I have end-item UID parts only, or do I also have embedded UID parts?

Exactly which parts require embedded UIDs and which do not is a gray area with which we see lots of suppliers struggle. In a perfect world, your contract would just tell you what to mark, but we've yet to see a contract with that level of guidance. Best bet is to make a plan and float it past your customer for approval.

A word about Parents and Children...

• End-item UIDs are the "things" that are listed on the CLIN description and are sometimes called Parent UIDs.
• Embedded UIDs are all the sub-components to the end-item UIDs and are sometimes called Child UIDs. They can also be sub-sub-components, sub-sub-sub-components, etc. Embedded UIDs are referred to by level, as well, such as "first level embedded", "second level embedded", etc. Think of it like a family history. The end-item UIDs are those great-great grandparents at the top of the chart. Their children are like first-level embedded UIDs. Their grandchildren are like second-level embedded UIDs, and so forth.

Take for example a Jeep. The Jeep is what is sold to the government, and has an end-item UID. The Jeep also has an engine, transfer case, and transmission, all of which if they fell under the UID mandate would be embedded UIDs.

This article is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

Why Automate WAWF Transactions?

The Way We've ALWAYS Done It ...

We informally poll DOD suppliers when we discuss WAWF automation with them. Typically they tell us that the same data is entered 5-7 times per shipment, and multiple times for labels on different levels of packaging. Redundant data entry increases costs and likelihood for error. It's also tedious!

Let's outline a typical scenario without any kind of integration or automation for a DOD supplier. It starts with the ERP or financial system, which typically does not have capabilities to automatically receive contract data from the government. Type it in. Next a stand alone labeling system is used to create the container labels. Type it in. Repeat for each packaging level (unit, intermediate, exterior, pallet...). Don't forget RFID tags. Type it in. Need forms? Type it in. Invoice and Receiving Report in WAWF? Type it in.

Same data-typed and re-typed.

HOW DID WE GET HERE?

Does this mean that DOD suppliers have cornered the market on inefficiency? Absolutely NOT. For years and years it made sense for suppliers to operate in these silo function areas. The process was simple and easy to support. If forms were required, people used a typewriter or word processor. For labels? Just roll a sheet into the typewriter or use a computer to copy and change the labels you used last time.

With this type of process in place, these systems grew up organically over the years.  Suppliers met the few requirements in place with the simplest method possible and added new methods as needed.

What changed?

The demands on DOD suppliers have changed dramatically in the past few years. We can break this down into two broad areas-eCommerce and Serialization.

eCommerce means the DOD wants your data electronically -

Doing business with the DOD is increasingly electronic. Nearly gone is the dependence on paper for contracting, receiving, invoicing, and payment. Instead, the DOD wants to communicate with suppliers via electronic transactions.

Of course, suppliers can receive electronic transactions, print them out, and pretend things are as they were. They can use their paper to read from while they type data back into government systems, such as WAWF. How you handle the data within your four walls is up to you. But the fact remains that DOD commerce is eCommerce and suppliers can adapt or find themselves at a competitive disadvantage.

Serialization means the DOD wants detailed information about your shipment -

Serialization requirements fall into two groups-parts and packages. And to make it more challenging there is some overlap between the requirements for serialization of parts and packages.

Serialization of parts isn't anything new. What is new is the requirement for globally unique part serialization and for the requirement to store serialization data in a central data system. We are talking about the UID (Unique Identification) requirement.

This requirement is only for certain parts being sold to the DOD, but when it is required it means that suppliers have to apply a permanent serial number to the part, apply the serial number to the outside of the shipping container, and register the serial number with the UID Registry (directly to the UID Registry or through WAWF). This has to be done for each and every part under the UID mandate. Marking and registration also has to be done for some sub-components of UID parts.

That's a lot of data, long lists of it. And these long lists of data have to be created and used during manufacturing, packaging, invoicing, and shipping.

Serialization of containers for DOD is relatively new. The RFID mandate means each case and pallet requires a unique serial number and these serial numbers must be submitted to the DOD. A typical RFID tag has a 24-digit string of letters and numbers, which is not something easily memorized and prone to data entry error. Depending on your business, you can have 10s, 100s or 1000s of these data strings to enter each day.

Parts and Packages Serialization Overlap -

Notice that we said that both part and package serial numbers must be submitted to the DOD. Actually, when both the UID and the RFID mandate apply to a shipment not only do UID and RFID have to be submitted, they have to be cross-referenced. So the supplier must describe which UID parts are in which RFID package on which RFID pallet (if applicable).

We illustrate this point in our eBook DOD Supplier Guide.

Is the case for automation becoming clear?

It is not that you cannot operate manually, you can. If your volume dictates a manual process and that process enables your business to reach its objectives, then a manual process may be best for you.  However, the digital age is here to stay with the US Department of Defense, and its eBusiness initiatives will continue to grow.

Learn more about WAWF automation in our eBook DOD Suppliers Guide.

UID - Too Much is as Bad as Too Little

Not understanding your UID requirements can be painful. Consider a couple of worst case scenarios which we've actually seen, and which illustrate the importance of planning -

They Did Nothing

We know of more than one supplier who had UID requirements on their contract but did nothing to comply with the requirements. They didn't know what to do, so they did nothing. Their inspector/acceptor didn't understand the requirements either, so they also did nothing.

"We've always done it this way and we've never had a problem" was the call of the day.

Eventually the oversight of the supplier caught up with them. After months or in one case 2 years, someone on the government side of the street realized that the requirements were not being met. But by then, dozens, hundreds, even thousands of systems or parts were in the field that should have been marked and registered, but were not.

Shipments were frozen, payments were withheld, and discussions started about how the supplier would find, mark, and register all those deployed systems and parts. Supplier ratings were affected. The ability to win future business was impacted. Individual professional responsibility was brought into light.

Failing to comply with a customer requirement is risky. Failing to comply with a customer requirement that dictates that you physically touch the products that you are selling, as well as organize and submit a complex set of data, is just foolhardy.

They Did Too Much

At the opposite end of the spectrum from suppliers who do too little to comply, we've seen suppliers do too much to comply.

The supplier didn't make the effort to get educated. As a for-profit enterprise they naturally wanted to do as little to comply as possible. The supplier assumed that compliance requirements were less than they actually were.

Their inspector/acceptor also didn't get educated. Since the government inspector/acceptor's job is to make sure contractual requirements are met, they wanted to make certain that the supplier did all perceived required tasks to comply. The inspector/acceptor assumed that the compliance requirements were greater than they actually were.

Parts were marked that didn't need to be marked. Equipment and supplies were bought that didn't need to be bought. Processes were needlessly changed. The supplier ended up doing more, sometimes much more, than they would have had to do, because they didn't know the facts.

Had the supplier laid out a plan that showed an understanding of the requirements as well as methods and processes to meet the requirements, in the end they would have had to do less to comply, saving them money and effort.

This is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?

UID Makes “Business as Usual” a Thing of the Past

The requirement for U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) suppliers to comply with the UID (Unique Identification) mandate isn't just the addition of one more contract requirement - it's more like multiplication. 

"The Good Old Days"

In the past suppliers could describe their shipment at a CLIN level (such as: "250 Electric Motors"). With the addition of a UID requirement, now the same supplier has to uniquely identify and describe each and every part (such as: 1 Electric Motor with UID = D1HLD978-44-00100001, 1 Electric Motor with UID = D1HLD978-44-00100002, 1 Electric Motor with UID = D1HLD978-44-00100003, etc.).

And now we start to Multiply...

There isn't just one touch-point for this handling of multiplied amounts of data; there are at least 5 process steps in which UID data must be recorded, correlated, and regurgitated.

Multiple functional areas are also involved-Contracting, Customer Service, Finance, Manufacturing, Packaging, and Shipping are all involved in UID.

Multiplied amounts of data handled in at least 5 process steps across a number of functional areas-it's no wonder that suppliers are concerned.

Add in the interconnected requirements of WAWF (Wide Area Workflow) and RFID (radio frequency identification) and you have a real nail-biter.

A sensible approach can take a lot of the sting out of UID compliance.

With proper education and planning you can save significant cash and keep your customer happy (relatively). But a make-it-up-as-you-go approach is going to cost you-cash, aggravation, and customer trust & loyalty.

There are lots of resources available to learn the nuts & bolts of UID, so much resources in fact that it is extremely difficult to glean out the exact nuggets that you need.

This is an excerpt from the DOD Suppliers Guide - "Ten Key Questions about your UID Plan." 

We want to hear what you have to say.

• How has UID impacted your business?
• Has it exponentially increased the complexity of shipping to the DOD or is it "just another serial number?"
• If you were starting UID all over again, what would you be sure to do the same? What would you do differently? Why?