Freight forwarder AI software that works at the ops level.
TIO is an AI agent workforce for freight forwarders. The agents sit between your inbox and the TMS you already run, do the back-office job functions, and pre-fill every record. Your team approves the records they draft.
What does AI for freight forwarders actually mean?
AI for freight forwarders is software that reads the unstructured work a forwarding operation runs on, emails, worksheets, bills of lading, and carrier responses, and turns it into finished records in the TMS. It splits three ways: document tools that parse a PDF you hand them, quoting tools that price a lane, and agents that do the ops work end to end. TIO is the third kind. The ISF agent drafts the filing, the order entry agent creates the lot, the quote agent drafts the quote, the audit and finance agents re-check and reconcile. Each one reads the inbox, does the prep, and hands the record to a person. Document extraction is one step inside that, not the whole product.
| The three kinds | What it takes in | What it hands back | Who finishes the job |
|---|---|---|---|
| Document extraction tools | A PDF someone uploads. | Structured fields on a screen. | Your team, keying the fields into the TMS. |
| Quoting tools | A lane and a rate table. | A price. | Your team, on everything after the quote is won. |
| Agents (TIO) | The inbox as it already arrives. | A drafted filing or a created lot, in your TMS, with sources shown. | A person approves; the agent did the rest. |
Evaluating vendors? The longer checklist, six questions that separate agents from extraction tools with an agent label, is in how to evaluate an AI agent for freight forwarding.
The inbox is your real ops system. The agents run it.
Every email routed in seconds
Bookings, pre-alerts, carrier responses, agent updates. Each message is read, identified, and routed to the job it belongs to, with no one sorting the inbox by hand.
Records pre-filled, not re-typed
A booking, pre-alert, or B/L arrives and the agent extracts the fields and pre-fills the lot. Your team reviews and approves before anything writes to the TMS you already run.
Rates tracked at the job level
Requests go to several carriers and the replies come back in different formats. The quote agent reads each, ties it to the job, and surfaces the comparison to pick from.
Ask anything in plain English
Job status, email history, invoice lookups, container position. The agent answers from everything it has read, with the source cited. No TMS navigation required.
From email in to reviewed record, step by step.
An email arrives
A booking, pre-alert, carrier rate, or arrival notice lands in your shared inbox.
The agent classifies it
It identifies the email type and resolves the sender, including overseas agents writing in inconsistent formats.
It binds to the right job
The message is tied to the correct open lot across whichever lane it belongs to, with no manual sorting.
It extracts and pre-fills
The relevant fields are pulled with a confidence score and the source text for each.
Your team reviews
The operator checks the pre-filled fields against the source, corrects anything low-confidence, and approves.
The approved data writes
It posts through the TMS API. The TMS stays the system of record. The records the agents draft wait for a person to approve them.
TIO does not replace your TMS. It runs across ocean import, ocean export, air import, air export, domestic trucking, and sales quotes from one agent workforce, and connects to the inbox and the TMS you already run in days, not weeks. For customs, the licensed filer of record reviews and submits exactly as before.
30 min → seconds
Lot creation, per shipment, across 25+ jobs a week at a US import forwarder.
15 min → seconds
ISF prep, per shipment, across 20 filings a week, submitted by a person.
About two days a week
Team time back. The full case study →
Straight answers.
What is AI for freight forwarders?
AI for freight forwarders is software that reads the unstructured work a forwarding team runs on, emails, worksheets, bills, and carrier responses, and turns it into finished records in the TMS. It splits three ways: document tools that extract fields from a PDF you hand them, quoting tools that price lanes, and agents that carry a job from the inbox to a drafted filing or created lot. The difference that matters is where the work stops: extraction hands your team fields to key; an agent hands them a record to approve.
What results should a forwarder expect?
At the US import freight forwarder running TIO’s agents in production, lot creation went from about 30 minutes by hand to seconds across 25 or more jobs a week, and ISF prep from about 15 minutes to seconds across 20 filings a week. That is about two days a week of team time back, with a person still reviewing and approving every record. Accuracy is shown on your own shipments in a demo rather than quoted as a number.
Is AI safe to use near customs filings?
Only with a person in the loop, which is how TIO is built. The agents draft the ISF; the filer of record reviews and submits it, exactly as before. ISF liability sits with the filer, which is why no responsible product files autonomously. External email and document text is treated as data, never as instructions, with a defense layer on every agent that reads outside content.
How is this different from the AI tools we already tried?
Most logistics AI stops at extraction: it parses a document and returns structured fields, and your team still does the TMS entry, which was the expensive part. An agent finishes the job. It starts itself when the email arrives, resolves the content against your jobs and parties, stages the record in the TMS you already run, and asks instead of guessing when something does not add up. If you want the full checklist, read our guide to evaluating an AI agent before you sign.
See it run a real shipment.
Twenty minutes, no setup. Bring a real document and watch an agent take it to a finished draft while you’re on the call.
Book a demo