Red Tape
© Mike2focus

Freight booking platforms have insisted they are not waging war on forwarders, but on manual processes.

However, the online platforms have a long way to go if they wish to do for freight forwarders what, for example, Uber has done for San Francisco’s Yellow Cab.

Responding to ...

To read this article you need to subscribe.

Help us to continue to invest in award-winning independent journalism. For an introductory offer of just £70 a year, or £10 per month, get access to all our daily news stories and opinion. If you are already a registered user, please login below with your current account's email and password to subscribe. If you are not registered and want to subscribe, please register below to subscribe.
Current subscriber
New subscriber

Comment on this article


You must be logged in to post a comment.
  • Steve Cooper

    February 09, 2017 at 3:27 pm

    Only speaking with a human being can certain issues be handled. For example, if a carrier ‘cannot cover haulage’, the AI will state the same. As a human forwarder, I could ask many haulage companies who work for these carriers and have haulages covered on a ‘preferred haulier’ basis. Or merchant haulage. This is one example of many, AI will not have the capacity to think logically and logistically to overcome certain issues. And how many times in our private routine do we say to ourselves, “I just need to speak with another human”, whilst waiting on an automated system trying to figure out why we have been charged £10 extra for our Broadband connection.

  • Rachel Finch

    February 09, 2017 at 3:55 pm

    Imagine if uber only worked when you wanted to go to certain places at certain times with surcharges going up and down for no reason. Stupid.