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Jan. 13, 2012—Ameya Logistics has been employing an RFID-based freight-container tracking solution that it designed and co-developed, and has been sharing data collected by the system with its customers, in order to enable them to locate their containers stored at Ameya’s container freight station (CFS), at any time, via the Internet or on a mobile phone using SMS text messaging. The system—which tracks each container’s whereabouts via an ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) EPC Gen 2 passive RFID tag—benefits both Ameya Logistics and its customers, by helping the company know each container’s location within its yard, as well as which empty slots are available for newly arrived containers.

The most immediate benefit, according to Ameya Logistics, has been a reduction in the time required for workers to search for containers stored within the yard when they need to be inspected for clearance, or shipped out from the CFS. While finding a container among the approximately 5,000 on hand could take a long time in the past, with the RFID system it takes only a matter of minutes, the firm reports. Employees can now simply view the software, identify where a particular container was last placed, according to the RFID data, and then proceed to that location.

The solution—developed jointly by Ameya Logistics’ IT department, under the leadership of Amol Jumde, the company’s IT and business process manager, and technology solutions company C&B Electronics—was installed in October 2011. C&B Electronic also provided the hardware for the implementation.

This project was conceived and initiated by Percy Vapiwala, Ameya Logistics’ CEO, who says he wanted to reduce human intervention within the CFS’ high-risk operational areas, “and at the same time ease the tracking pain of our customer.” The deployment was also aimed at improving operational efficiencies. In addition, Vapiwala says, Ameya’s managing director, Ashish Goel, “wanted to provide value-added services to customers at no additional cost, and the entire team rose to the challenge and implemented the RFID technology.”

Ameya Logistics’ CFS, located at the Jawaharlal Nehru Port, near Mumbai, stores and delivers import, export and bonded containers and cargo to more than 200 different customers (the shippers). It has been in operation for about three years. Approximately 5,000 to 6,000 containers are located at the CFS at any given time, with each 20- or 40-foot container remaining on site for an average of 10 to 12 days. While at the yard, the containers imported to India must be inspected according to that country’s customs requirements—usually by customs agents, who complete the import customs requirements for the shipper. Upon arriving at the yard to conduct an inspection, an agent must be escorted to that specific container.

Cuts in gas and electricity prices by four of the Big Six suppliers this week came as a welcome relief for consumers – but are unlikely to presage a new era of shrinking bills, analysts and industry executives warn.

On Friday Npower became the fourth company in three days to cut prices, after EDF Energy, SSE, and Centrica-owned British Gas, putting pressure on holdouts Eon and Scottish Power. Companies that were chastised last year for raising prices seemed to be falling over each other to cut them – providing a rare piece of good news for hard-pressed households.

British Gas, which cut only electricity bills this week, said it did not rule out doing the same with gas bills in the short term. But there was a warning that consumers should not expect a cascade of more reductions.

“The balance of probability in the longer-term is that prices are more likely to go up than down,” said Ian Peters, managing director of British Gas Energy.

What has driven the cuts is a dramatic year-on-year drop in power demand. Wholesale gas prices soared last year as one of the coldest winters on record cut stocks to critical levels.

The Fukushima nuclear disaster made things worse, as liquefied natural gas cargoes that could have gone to the UK were instead diverted to Japan. Civil war in Libya knocked out pipeline gas to Italy, further squeezing energy markets. The Big Six raised bills by about 15-20 per cent in response.

This year, things are different. A mild winter, combined with the economic slowdown, has brought UK gas demand down 30 per cent year on year. Gas storage is 88 per cent full, compared to 42 per cent last year. As a result, wholesale gas prices have fallen a quarter since last September.

Wholesale power prices have plunged too, partly driven by a sharp reduction in the price of European carbon permits, which have dropped from about €17 a tonne last summer to €6.50 euros.

However, industry analysts said the fall in wholesale prices did not necessarily herald more cuts in household energy bills.

“It all depends on how far forward the utilities bought power and gas and by how much,” said Andrew Horstead, risk analyst at Utilyx.

British Gas, for example, which has 10m gas customers, has an “obligation to procure substantial gas supplies for the winter”, said Mr Peters, and so “lacks the flexibility to pass on price reductions in gas to consumers”.

Analysts warn that wholesale prices only make up about half of the tariff. The rest, so-called “non-commodity costs”, range from green taxes to the cost of upgrading the ageing transmission and distribution system, which is partly borne by the utilities. Analysis confirmed that bills were more likely to go up than down.

A report by the government’s committee on climate change in December projected that the combined gas and electricity bill for the typical household could rise in real terms from £1,060 in 2010 to £1,250 in 2020, on a mid-case scenario. That is a much more moderate increase than the jump seen over the past six years.

The CCC’s breakdown of energy bills found that the average dual-fuel energy bill rose from about £605 in 2004 to £1,060 in 2010. That 75 per cent jump compares with a 16 per cent rise in general price inflation over the same period.

Such costs are growing, crimping their ability to pass on falling wholesale gas prices to customers. Non-commodity costs made up 36 per cent of bills a year ago but are expected to rise to 39-40 per cent in 2012, British Gas says.

It is this increase that has fuelled public anger towards the Big Six, especially over the past year or so – a time when they also faced widespread accusations of profiteering and mis-selling.

Companies were accused by consumer groups and MPs of targeting vulnerable households with offers which often did not result in promised savings. The successful prosecution of SSE in May for mis-selling to consumers led it to suspend doorstep selling in July and most of its rivals soon followed suit.

In October, the Big Six faced calls to simplify their tariff systems from Ofgem, after the energy regulator found that the companies’ profit margins had soared since June.

Since then Ian Marchant, SSE’s chief executive, has backed moves to ban the use of “predatory pricing” by energy suppliers which, he has conceded, can penalise “loyal” customers who did not shop around and also be used to exclude new entrants from the retailing market.

But some have argued that not only customers but the companies themselves have been casualties of rising energy costs. Last year, Mr. Marchant rejected accusations made by Ofgem that suppliers had benefited from escalating bills. He blamed “margin compression” caused by escalating wholesale gas prices for pushing SSE’s energy supply business into loss for the first six months of the year.

Though consumer groups stressed that last week’s reductions would not make too much of a dent in bills, there was rare praise for the companies.

“This is the quickest succession of price cuts we’ve ever seen, and we hope it signals a greater responsiveness on the part of the suppliers,” said Adam Scorer, director of policy at Consumer Focus, the statutory consumers’ champion. “It may also indicate they have slowly started to take on board consumer concerns that wholesale prices have been factored into customer bills more quickly when they rise than when they fall.”