Freight forwarder AI software that works at the ops level.
TIO is an AI agent workforce for freight forwarders and freight brokerages. The agents sit between your inbox and the TMS you already run and do back-office jobs. Each action has its own setting: it runs on its own, goes to your team for review, or waits for your team’s reply.
- 01Source document
- 02Agent reads and enters
- 03Completed jobin your TMS
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 carry a job from the inbox to a finished record. TIO is the third kind. At a US import forwarder, the order entry agent creates the lot, the finance agent books the payable, and the audit agent re-checks finished records. Quote agents run today at a US trucking agency. Each agent reads the documents that arrive by email, does the work, and then runs on its own, sends the result for review, or waits for a person, depending on its setting. 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 created lot in your TMS with a review email that shows every field, or a drafted filing. | Your team reviews what the agent created. Anything outside your rules goes to a person. |
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 work from it.
Inbox triage, in pilot
A shared mailbox sorted by what each email is, which shipment it belongs to and who should handle it. It runs in pilot at a US trucking agency. It sorts in the background and nothing is sent.
Records created, not re-typed
A booking, pre-alert, or bill of lading arrives and the order entry agent reads it and creates the lot or delivery order in the TMS you already run. It then sends a review email that shows every field.
Quoting, scoped first for forwarders
Quote agents read a rate request, pull live carrier rates, and reply in the customer’s thread. They run in production today at a US trucking agency. For a forwarder, we scope quoting first.
Ask by email, get the source
At a US import forwarder, an agent answers duty rate questions by email with the published rate and its source. At a US trucking agency, the ops agent answers a staff question about a load with the status and the document attached. It reads; it does not change an order.
From email in to reviewed record, step by step.
An email arrives
A booking, pre-alert, or arrival notice lands in your shared inbox.
The agent reads it
It identifies the document type and resolves the parties, including overseas agents writing in inconsistent formats.
It matches your data
The parties and references are matched against your existing data. A party it cannot match goes to a person.
It extracts the fields
The relevant fields are pulled from the documents, charge lines included.
It creates the record
The agent writes the lot through its adapter for your TMS. The TMS stays the system of record. A configured TMS write action can be disabled without disabling the others.
Your team reviews
The review email shows every field. The operator checks the fields against the source and corrects anything wrong. TIO turns each correction into a rule for your operation.
TIO does not replace your TMS. In production at a US import forwarder, it covers order entry for ocean, air and domestic lots, payables, audits of finished work, arrival date updates, customs filing drafts, and tariff rate lookups by email. Ocean export and air export are scoped with you first. TIO works through an adapter built for your TMS. For any other system, we first check what it lets an agent read and write. For customs, a licensed person on your team reviews and files.
30 min → seconds
Lot creation, per shipment, across 25+ jobs a week at a US import forwarder.
12 min → 12 sec
LTL quote reply, median, at a US trucking agency running the quote agents.
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 created lot or a drafted filing. The difference that matters is where the work stops: extraction hands your team fields to key; an agent hands them a finished record to review.
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. That is about two days a week of team time back, with each lot sent to a person for review. Accuracy is shown on your own shipments in a demo rather than quoted as a number.
Is AI safe to use near customs filings?
Customs filings stay with a person. The agent prepares the filing data as a draft, and a licensed person on your team reviews and files it, exactly as before. TIO never files. Filing liability sits with the filer. During document extraction, external text is separated from model instructions and checked for allowed fields, formats and manipulation patterns.
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, creates the record in the TMS you already run, and sends it for review. When something does not add up, it sends the question to a person with the facts attached instead of guessing. If you want the full checklist, read our guide to evaluating an AI agent before you sign.
Where the work happens.
All solutions
See it run a real shipment.
Bring a real document and watch an agent take it to a finished draft while you’re on the call.
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