While freight technology has grown increasingly efficient, the separation of freight procurement and payment remains a hurdle, leading to cumbersome reconciliation, time wasted on transfers to multiple partners, and expensive credit guarantees.
After facilitating well over 100,000 digital ebookings between forwarders and carriers in Q1 of 2022, WebCargo by Freightos is the first cargo booking platform to unify real-time rates and booking with payments. A rigorous pilot is now concluding successfully after handling hundreds of shipments for some thirty participating forwarders and two airline groups across three countries, proving itself as a valuable driver of efficiency.
Progress was accelerated with Freightos’ global payment expertise, which already facilitates
tens of millions of dollars in annual payments. “Freight and payments are foundations of global trade, but both introduce friction. Until today, forwarders booked cargo on one platform and paid on another, which is like shopping on Amazon but paying on Paypal,” said Zvi Schreiber, CEO of the Freightos Group. “We aim to digitalise both on one platform, improving how forwarders and carriers interact and providing a better experience for importers and exporters.”
“Since we started using WebCargo, our business has increased significantly,” said Nirav
Gandhi, managing director of Spring World, a UK freight forwarder. “We started with WebCargo six months ago, and it is now our main booking platform. It’s brilliant and a godsend. We are able to place a paid for and confirmed booking in just ten minutes.”
Platform payments are now operational in the United States, Europe, and the United Kingdom, with plans to roll out in parts of Asia imminently. Qatar Airways Cargo was the first airline to pilot the solution and is joined by IAG Cargo, with additional airlines expected shortly. This solution also drives significant benefits for the dozens of airlines available for live booking on WebCargo.
“Integrated payments is a natural progression from digital bookings,” said Guillaume Halleux, chief cargo officer at Qatar Airways Cargo. “By unifying payments with bookings, we can provide more effective and efficient service to a growing base of customers worldwide, safely and securely. As a matter of fact, this technology opens new frontiers to airlines by allowing them to accept bookings from every freight forwarder in a given market without having to setup or maintain a stock of AWB.”
Peter Roberts, head of distribution at IAG Cargo said: “We are delighted to be part of
WebCargo by Freightos’s new integrated payment platform, which supports our objective of
streamlining the customer journey. It is an extremely exciting time for the industry.
“At IAG Cargo we’re continually looking at ways to drive efficiencies for customers – this
partnership is a natural continuation of our work with Freightos and helps to significantly reduce the time it takes for a new customer to book with IAG Cargo safely and securely”
