Facing a competitive process each time you ship your products will affect the cash flow of your business. Even though you needed to rely on freight rate history in the past years to identify the best rates for your cargo shipments, today there are multiple ways to do that.
This is where the freight rate index or freight benchmarking comes in handy. This is the greatest solution to determine the exact costs of your shipments. Additionally, you will be able to negotiate perfectly which will ultimately enhance savings.
The freight rate index is known as a system that is commonly used by export-import-oriented businesses so that they can compare and evaluate the accurate freight rates they are paying for the container shipments. Apart from that, the freight rate index also allows companies to ensure that they are paying relevant money for their freight shipments. Here are the top 3 reasons why your business needs to use the freight rate index.
The Recent Freight Rate History Isn’t Sufficient
The first thing business owners assume is that they can consider freight rate index tools to benchmark the shipping container prices by only checking the freight rate history on the internet. However, this isn’t sufficient.
Your internet history will only give you a slight hint on the freight rate. In short words, it’s not enough to determine the price of the freights. It will prevent you from knowing what your competitors are paying for their freight shipment or the freight trend.
On the other hand, the international freight rate index is crafted in such a way that it will showcase thousands of rates with no limit. Not only do they allow you to see the proper pricing history but also the real-time freight rate of the market.
Reviewing the Freight Rates Isn’t Enough
If you review the recent bills of your freight rate to determine the benchmarked rate, then you’re not doing it correctly. Keep in mind that the bills of your previous freights are based on your negotiation.
This is why you need to use the freight rate index to notice the proper rate of containers as well as cargo. No matter if the freight bills are generated for the customers or the ones you received from the carriers, reviewing them will always be influenced by extending negotiation. It might fail to provide an appropriate understanding of the proper market rates.
They are Trusted
Most of the services of the freight rate index are free. Hence, you can leverage the system easily even if you run a small business. For instance, you can use various freight index tools that will help you to track the rate of shipments without spending any amount of money.
This means that you can easily and effectively negotiate the freight rates for each shipment without paying any additional expenses. When you implement this fact for your massive amount of shipment, you’ll realize the power of cost-effectiveness of the freight rate index. Additionally, the enhanced discoverability over the rates of the market would improve your decision-making ability. As per Mtdtraining, improving the decision-making ability will also increase your productivity.
Conclusion
Nowadays, the freight and shipping industry is more advanced and fast-paced than ever. Hence, the freight rate index has become one of the most important factors for supply chain leaders to track the rate of their container shipments. Despite the size of your company, an effective freight rate index will help you to stand apart from your competitors.