To track down what’s happening with your cargo today, you probably go to multiple websites, log into separate systems, make phone calls, and then transcribe all of the details in a spreadsheet that’s emailed back and forth with your team. At best, this process is a time-consuming hassle when you’re managing hundreds of containers. When you’re managing thousands of containers, it’s nearly impossible to stay on top of.

Missing crucial information, such as a container’s last free day in the terminal before demurrage fees are assessed, or details about holds or other issues with your cargo, can result in delays and fees. With demurrage fees ranging from $75-$150 per day (and typically increasing the longer a container is left at a terminal), the costs add up.

If you have better visibility into a container’s location and status, you can do better planning. Using our dashboard, you can easily see all of your containers that are due to arrive in the next two weeks and identify the ones that have holds or other issues so that any potential problems can be resolved before the container arrives at the terminal. You can also get notifications about important information, including a container’s last free day, so you can ensure that your trucker will arrive in time to pick up the container.

When you can do better planning, the results can be significant. One of our customers was able to reduce their average dwell times (the number of days a container is in a terminal) from four days to less than two days, and reduce their demurrage fees by nearly $40,000 in one quarter due to the efficiencies they gained with better data.

Not only are they saving money that they had been spending on demurrage, but they're moving their cargo through terminals faster, making their supply chain more efficient. The terminals also benefit, as they’re increasing their efficiency and throughput without any effort on their part.

Reducing dwell times and demurrage fees are just the tangible benefits of having better visibility into your import containers. Not having to email those spreadsheets back and forth to your team is a bonus.