Freight forwarding is always a challenging business, from narrow profits to staying abreast with the current statutory and regulatory requirements of the industry at all times. Add freight forwarding software to the mix and you’ll help your business and yourself take on these challenges with some ease. There are several issues impacting businesses that are in the management and movement of goods. Buying the right freight forwarding tool is therefore paramount. The following are the things to consider when purchasing the software.

Single Platform

Before choosing a software, determine what your business’ freight forwarding requirements are. For instance, a medium- or small-scale freight forwarding software company would use multiple applications for managing functions, which includes documentation, freight management, customs brokerage, container tracking, shipment tracking and compliance services. If all these applications are integrated into one platform, things would become more straightforward for a firm. Operations would be more efficient, accurate, and cost-effective.

Centralized Database

Another important parameter is the usage of a centralized and secured database. A centralized database would help avoid disconnected, independent data pools. This will make sure there is no unnecessary delay or disruption and the business is protected against data duplication. A centralized database would let the system to read, modify and write data from and to different branch offices. This would truly help a business with tracking shipment-wise payment, outstanding details, profitability, and performances.

Adaptability

Make sure the logistics management tool lets you create different hierarchies, divisions, and connect with logistics networks without requiring software engineers to make any hard code modifications in the tool. This would ensure there are no unnecessary delays and additional costs to bear.

Configuration

Make sure the software you buy is completely customizable. It must offer the flexibility you require in your firm and that you could bring about required tweaks without having to make any complex alterations to the software.

User-Friendliness

Determine if the tool is user-friendly or it lets you set up or input in new customers without much effort. The software must be straightforward enough for any member of your operational team to handle it with minimal training. An efficient tool would let you configure your workflow, thereby saving you significant amount of cost and time.

Customer Visibility

The software should be on point with the level of customer visibility it offers. Ensure the tool helps create a dedicated portal for every customer or several portals, if needed. This would let your customers access all shipment information easily and quickly. The time and money required to manually process the information and remove error risk would be avoided.