Professionals working in the shipping business may sound different when you hear them talking among themselves. You might mistake them for discussing the latest discovery on the red planet! Admittedly, people employed in the cargo trucking industry (for instance, a third-party logistics trucking in Vancouver) have a language of their own. Ordinary people like you and I find them hard to understand at the first instance.
Those who are planning to ship the birthday presents from Canada to their cousins in the neighboring US may be clueless about the terms the shipping company staff utters from the other side of the phone. Or for those who are planning to order crates of sparkling wines from the USA to Canada, there are few shipping terms that they need to know and understand the fundamentals at the very least.
COMMODITY AND FREIGHT
First in the line is the commodity. This refers to any article meant for shipment and has a commercial value. It could be anything under the sun. A commodity could be as big as a yacht to as small as a box of toys and even your favorite cigarettes. While waiting in a queue at the service counter of a third-party logistics trucking in Vancouver, you may have already come across the term freight quite a few times. Any commercial goods that are transported on board are called freight.
Other terms that exist in the shipping realm are FOB (freight on board), consignee, consignor, and invoicing, to name a few. These few core shipping terminologies are almost always mentioned over the phone, face-to-face, or during an online inquiry.
FREIGHT ON BOARD
FOB (freight on board) means the ownership of the shipped cargo. If the shipping contract says FOB origin, the ownership of the cargo is passed on to the buyer, which means the buyer of the goods has claim privilege from the port of origin in case the cargo is damaged during transit. If the FOB destination is mentioned in the agreement, it is the seller who still enjoys ownership of the cargo.
CONSIGNEE AND CONSIGNOR
Consignee and consignor are interchangeably used more often than not and that is quite an epic mistake! Note that the former is the one who receives the shipment while the consignor or the shipping company is the one that is responsible for delivering it to the destination.
Now that you have learned some of the shipping terms, don’t be alarmed if you are being invoiced! The invoice is essentially a document containing all the information about the goods that you are shipping and the sum of money you are expected to pay to the shipping service provider.
FTL AND LTL
Based on how big your shipment is, it may be grouped under FTL (full truckload), LTL (less than truckload), or parcel category. Your consignment may be deemed as too small by some carriers, or conversely, in the event of a large volume of goods, you may need to hire a carrier that is specialized in large container transportation.
If you need third-party logistics trucking in Vancouver, you can contact Welkin Transport.
