Glossary
Every term on your invoice, explained.
Clear definitions of common shipping, customs and logistics terms, and why each one appears on a quote or invoice.
13 terms
Ocean freight
Container shipping: the equipment, the service structure and the terms that appear on an ocean bill of lading.
- Consolidation
Combining several shipments into one container or one air consolidation to share the cost of the unit.
It converts a per-shipment cost into a shared one, which is what makes LCL and air consolidations economic. The trade is time: a consolidation waits for its closing date, and that wait is part of the transit.
SeeLess than Container Load,House Air Waybill,Container Freight Station
- Container Freight StationCFS
A facility where LCL consignments are consolidated into containers for export and unstuffed from them on import.
Every LCL shipment passes through one at each end, and each pass generates a handling charge. CFS charges vary widely between ports and are billed per shipment, which is why they dominate the cost of small consignments and why they belong on the quote.
- Cut-off
The deadline before a sailing by which a container, its documentation or its VGM must be received.
There is more than one, and they do not fall together. Documentation, VGM and physical container cut-offs each have their own deadline ahead of the sailing, and missing any one of them rolls the booking. The documentation cut-off is usually the earliest and the most often missed.
SeeVerified Gross Mass,Rolled cargo,Importer Security Filing
- Direct service
A vessel service that calls at both the load port and the discharge port on the same rotation, without transhipment.
Faster and lower risk than transhipment, and usually priced accordingly. Worth confirming explicitly: a booking can be described as direct and still involve a relay if the service is restructured after the rate is agreed.
- Forty-foot Equivalent UnitFEU
A forty-foot container, equal to two TEU.
The practical default for most FCL cargo, because a 40ft box holds roughly twice the volume of a 20ft for well under twice the freight. The exception is dense cargo, where the weight limit is reached long before the box is full and a 20ft is the correct equipment.
- Full Container LoadFCL
A shipment that occupies a whole container, booked and priced as a container rather than by volume.
You pay for the box, not for what is in it, so the cost per cubic metre falls as you fill it. FCL also means the container is sealed at origin and not opened again until it is unstuffed, which removes the handling and consolidation delays that LCL carries.
SeeLess than Container Load,Cubic metre,Container Freight Station
- Less than Container LoadLCL
A shipment too small to justify its own container, consolidated with other cargo and charged on volume or weight.
LCL looks cheaper until the destination charges arrive. Container freight station handling, delivery order and terminal fees are levied per shipment rather than per cubic metre, so on a small consignment they can exceed the ocean freight itself. Ask for them at quotation, not on arrival.
SeeFull Container Load,Cubic metre,Container Freight Station,Revenue ton
- Non-Vessel Operating Common CarrierNVOCC
A carrier that issues its own bills of lading and contracts to carry cargo without operating the ships.
An NVOCC buys space from vessel operators and resells it under its own document, which is why a house bill exists alongside a master bill. In the US the activity is licensed and bonded as an ocean transportation intermediary.
- Port omission
A carrier's decision to skip a scheduled port call, usually to recover a delayed vessel's schedule.
This is the single most common reason a container arrives later than the quoted transit, and it is why port-to-port transit times are quoted as ranges. The cargo is carried to the next port on the rotation and returned, which can add a fortnight.
- Rolled cargo
A booked container that is not loaded on its intended sailing and is moved to a later one.
It happens when a vessel is overbooked or over its weight limit, and it happens most in peak season on the busiest lanes. A booking is not a guarantee of space unless it is a named premium product, which is exactly what those products are sold on.
- TranshipmentT/S
Moving cargo from one vessel to another at an intermediate port rather than sailing direct from origin to destination.
It adds a week or more and a second set of handling and schedule risk, which is why a transhipment routing and a direct one are not comparable on rate alone. On some lanes there is no direct call at all, so transhipment is the routing rather than a compromise.
- Twenty-foot Equivalent UnitTEU
The standard unit of container capacity: one TEU is one twenty-foot container, and a forty-foot container is two TEU.
TEU measures capacity, not cargo. Vessel sizes, terminal throughput and trade volumes are all quoted in it, which is why a headline figure about a lane says nothing about whether there is space for your specific box on your specific sailing.
- Verified Gross MassVGM
The certified total weight of a packed container plus its tare, which the shipper must declare before it can be loaded aboard a vessel.
Required under the SOLAS convention. No VGM, no loading: the terminal will not accept the box, and the deadline sits ahead of the container cut-off rather than with it. It is a shipper obligation, so it cannot be delegated away to the carrier.
3 terms
Air freight
Air cargo: how it is measured, how it is charged, and the handling steps between the shipper's door and the aircraft.
- Belly cargo
Freight carried in the lower hold of a passenger aircraft rather than on a dedicated freighter.
Most air freight capacity on dense passenger routes is belly capacity, which is why air rates track the passenger schedule. It also caps piece dimensions: lower-hold heights are considerably tighter than a freighter's main deck.
- Freighter
An aircraft configured to carry cargo only, loading through a main-deck door.
The route to fly oversized, heavy or dangerous goods that belly capacity cannot take. Freighter networks are thinner than passenger networks, so a freighter routing often means a hub connection and a longer door-to-door time than the flight time suggests.
- Known consignor
A shipper validated under an aviation security programme, whose cargo can enter the secure supply chain without further screening at the airport.
Unknown cargo has to be screened before it flies, and screening takes time and can require breaking down a built pallet. On a tight connection that is the difference between making the flight and rolling to the next one.
5 terms
Rail & road
Rail and road: the equipment, the regulatory limits on drivers, and the crossings that decide overland transit.
- Break of gauge
A point where two rail networks of different track widths meet and cargo must be transferred between wagon fleets.
European standard gauge is 1,435 mm; the CIS network is 1,520 mm. On Asia–Europe rail the transhipment at that boundary, not the distance, is where schedules slip, which is why a rail quote that does not name the crossing cannot be planned against.
SeeIntermodal
- Drayage
Short-distance road movement of a container between a port or rail terminal and a nearby facility.
Small on a map and large on an invoice. Drayage is billed against terminal appointment windows and driver waiting time, so port congestion converts directly into drayage cost, and it is the leg most often left out of a port-to-port comparison.
- Hours of serviceHOS
The regulatory limits on how long a commercial driver may drive and remain on duty.
US rules cap a single driver at eleven driving hours within a fourteen-hour on-duty window. Road transit estimates have to be built from that, not from distance divided by an average speed, or they will be optimistic in a predictable way.
- Intermodal
Moving one loaded unit across two or more modes without unpacking it, typically ocean to rail to road.
The efficiency comes from never handling the cargo itself, only the box. The exposure is that each interchange has its own dwell time and its own equipment availability, and those are where an intermodal schedule actually fails.
- Team drive
Two drivers on one vehicle, alternating so the truck keeps moving through mandatory rest periods.
Close to doubles the distance covered in a day at well under double the cost of two single-driver moves. It is the standard answer to a long-haul deadline that a single driver's hours cannot meet.
7 terms
Customs & compliance
Entry, classification, valuation and the filings that have to be made before cargo is allowed to load or release.
- Customs bond
A financial guarantee to the customs authority that duties, taxes and penalties on an import will be paid.
A single-entry bond covers one shipment; a continuous bond covers a year and is usually cheaper from a handful of shipments upward. No bond means no entry, and bond capacity can be exhausted by a run of high-value imports.
- Customs entry
The formal declaration that presents imported goods to the customs authority for release into commerce.
Release and liquidation are different moments. Cargo can be released and moving while the entry remains open for months, and the final duty determination, with any correction, comes at liquidation, not at the border.
SeeHarmonized Tariff Schedule,Customs bond,Importer of Record,Customs valuation
- Customs valuation
The declared value on which duty is assessed, normally the transaction value with specified additions.
Assists, royalties, packing and certain commissions may have to be added to the invoice price, and freight and insurance are treated differently depending on the country's basis of assessment. It is not simply what is on the commercial invoice.
SeeHarmonized Tariff Schedule,Customs entry,Commercial invoice
- Harmonized Tariff ScheduleHTS
The classification system that assigns every imported article a code determining its duty rate and any restrictions.
Classification is the importer's legal responsibility, not the forwarder's, and it drives duty, preference eligibility and admissibility. A wrong code is recoverable if found early and expensive if found in a post-entry audit years later.
- Importer of RecordIOR
The party legally responsible for an import entry: its accuracy, its duties and taxes, and any subsequent audit.
Agreeing to DDP terms usually means agreeing to be, or to appoint, the importer of record in the destination country. That is an ongoing legal exposure in a jurisdiction you may never have dealt with, not a delivery convenience.
- Importer Security FilingISF 10+2
A data filing US importers must make to CBP no later than twenty-four hours before cargo is loaded aboard a vessel at the foreign port.
The deadline is the loading moment, not the sailing and not the arrival. Late or inaccurate filings carry liquidated damages and can result in the container being held or not loaded at all, so on short origin legs the data has to be assembled while the box is still moving to the terminal.
- In-bond movement
Transport of goods under customs control, after arrival but before formal entry, on a specified bond type.
Immediate transportation moves goods inland for entry there; transportation and exportation moves them across the country for export; immediate exportation covers export from the arrival port. The type is chosen before the load is tendered, and the wrong one strands the cargo with no lawful way forward.
12 terms
Documentation
The paper, and increasingly the data, that has to be right before anything moves or releases.
- Air WaybillAWB
The air carrier's transport document: a receipt for the goods and evidence of the contract of carriage, never a document of title.
Unlike an ocean bill of lading it is non-negotiable, so cargo is released to the named consignee without any original being surrendered. That makes air release faster but means the air waybill cannot be used to control goods against payment.
- Bill of LadingB/L
The ocean carrier's document that acts as receipt for the cargo, evidence of the contract of carriage and, when negotiable, document of title.
The third function is the one that causes trouble. An original negotiable bill of lading has to be surrendered before the cargo is released, so if it is sitting in a bank or a courier bag the container sits too, accruing demurrage while it does.
- Certificate of OriginCOO
A document attesting the country in which goods were produced, used to claim preferential duty or to satisfy an import requirement.
Some destinations require it legalised or attested, and requirements differ meaningfully between neighbouring countries. A set that cleared one destination will not necessarily clear the next, which is the most common cause of delay on Gulf and South Asian imports.
- Commercial invoice
The seller's invoice to the buyer, and the primary document customs uses to assess value, origin and classification.
Vague descriptions are the most common cause of customs delay. 'Parts' or 'samples' will be queried; a description that states what the article is, what it is made of and what it does will usually not be.
- Delivery orderD/O
The instruction authorising a terminal or warehouse to release cargo to a named party.
Issued once the transport document is surrendered or released and all charges are settled. It carries its own fee at most destinations, and it is a frequent late surprise on LCL invoices.
- House Air WaybillHAWB
The air waybill a forwarder issues to its customer for a consignment moving under a consolidated master air waybill.
Your shipment travels on the forwarder's master document with the airline and on the house document with the forwarder. Tracking against the master number will show the consolidation's movement, not necessarily your piece count.
- House Bill of LadingHBL
A transport document issued by a freight forwarder or NVOCC to its customer, sitting underneath the carrier's own master bill.
The master bill covers the forwarder's relationship with the shipping line; the house bill covers yours with the forwarder. Consignee details, release instructions and any hold therefore exist at two levels, and both have to be cleared before the cargo moves.
- Incoterms
Standard three-letter trade terms published by the ICC that allocate cost, risk and responsibility for delivery between seller and buyer.
They govern who arranges and pays for each leg and where risk transfers. They do not transfer title, do not specify payment terms, and do not decide who is legally the importer, though they are routinely assumed to cover all three.
- Packing list
A document itemising how a shipment is packed: pieces, dimensions, weights and contents per package.
It is what allows a chargeable weight to be checked, a container load plan to be built and a customs examination to be resolved without unpacking everything. Dimensions on it should be the packed dimensions, not the product's.
- Safety Data SheetSDS / MSDS
The document setting out a substance's hazards, handling requirements and transport classification.
Required before any hazardous consignment can be booked, and it has to be current. Carriers and ground handlers check the classification on it against the declaration, and a mismatch stops the shipment at acceptance.
- Sea waybill
A non-negotiable ocean transport document that names the consignee, so no original paper has to be surrendered to take delivery.
It removes the delay and the demurrage risk of chasing original bills of lading. The trade-off is that it is not a document of title, so it does not suit transactions where payment depends on controlling the goods, most obviously a letter of credit.
- Telex release
A message from the origin office confirming that all original bills of lading have been surrendered, authorising release at destination without paper.
The standard fix when originals will not reach the consignee in time. It has to be arranged with the carrier at origin, and it will not be issued until the freight and any origin charges are settled, which is where it usually stalls.
13 terms
Charges & invoicing
The line items that turn a freight rate into a landed cost, and the clocks that generate them.
- Bunker Adjustment FactorBAF
A surcharge that passes marine fuel price movements through to the freight rate.
It floats separately from the base rate and is revised periodically, which is why a rate agreed months ago does not produce the invoice you expected. Ask whether a quote is all-in or base-plus-surcharges.
- Cargo insurance
Insurance covering physical loss or damage to goods in transit, arranged separately from the carrier's liability.
Carrier liability is limited by convention and calculated per kilogram, not by value, so it will not make you whole on anything valuable. Cargo insurance is the mechanism that does, and it is not included in a freight rate unless it is stated.
- Chargeable weight
The greater of a shipment's actual gross weight and its volumetric weight: the figure the freight is billed on.
This is why an air freight invoice can be several times what the scale says. Aircraft run out of space before they run out of lift, so light bulky cargo is charged on the room it occupies. Anything low-density is priced on volume.
- Cubic metreCBM
The volume unit ocean freight is measured in: length × width × height in metres.
Use packed dimensions, not product dimensions, and measure to the outside of the pallet including any overhang. Understating CBM does not save money: it produces a re-measure at the CFS and a corrected invoice.
- Demurrage
A charge for leaving a container inside the terminal beyond its allotted free time.
The clock runs on the terminal's yard space, so it is stopped by collecting the container, not by returning it. It is the more expensive of the two container clocks to ignore, because terminal tariffs escalate steeply per day.
- Destination charges
The fees levied at the discharge end: terminal handling, container freight station work, delivery order issue and documentation.
They are the most common reason a landed cost exceeds the quoted freight, and on LCL they can exceed the freight itself. They are quotable in advance, so their absence from a quote is a choice rather than an impossibility.
SeeContainer Freight Station,Terminal Handling Charge,Delivery order
- Detention
A charge for keeping a carrier's container outside the terminal beyond its free time, after collection and before return.
The clock runs on the carrier's equipment, so it is stopped by returning the empty. Demurrage and detention are two different clocks with two different owners, and a shipment can be accruing both at once.
- Dimensional divisor
The constant used to convert shipment volume into volumetric weight: 6,000 cm³/kg under the IATA air freight convention, 5,000 for most express services.
Two quotes at the same rate per kilo are not the same quote if they use different divisors. On a light, bulky consignment the divisor can move the bill by twenty per cent, so it belongs in the comparison alongside the rate.
- Free time
The days allowed for a container to sit in the terminal or stay out on hire before demurrage or detention begins.
It varies by carrier, by port and by contract, and it is negotiable at booking in a way it never is afterwards. Confirming free time before booking is materially cheaper than extending it later.
- Per diem
The daily rate charged for a container held beyond free time; in practice, the mechanism by which detention is billed.
Rates usually escalate in tiers, so the tenth day costs several times the first. Any plan that assumes a flat daily figure will understate the cost of a delay badly.
- Revenue tonR/T
The billing unit for LCL and breakbulk: the greater of one cubic metre or one metric tonne, whichever produces more revenue.
The ocean equivalent of chargeable weight. Dense cargo is billed on weight, light cargo on volume, and the invoice takes whichever is higher, so a light pallet and a heavy one of the same size cost the same.
- Terminal Handling ChargeTHC
The terminal's charge for moving a container between the vessel and the yard, levied at both origin and destination.
Whether it is included depends on the Incoterm and on the quotation basis, and it is one of the largest single line items after the freight. Two quotes are not comparable until you know which side of the rate the THC sits on.
- Volumetric weight
A shipment's volume converted into a notional weight using a fixed divisor, so that bulky low-density cargo pays for the space it takes.
For air freight the IATA convention is 6,000 cm³ per kilogram, so a cubic metre counts as 167 kg. Express and courier operators commonly use 5,000, which makes the same box more expensive. The divisor matters as much as the rate.
14 terms
Cargo & equipment
Cargo types, packing, equipment and the loads that break the standard process.
- Breakbulk
Cargo loaded as individual pieces directly into a vessel's hold rather than in containers.
The route for anything too large, too heavy or too awkward to containerise. It brings vessel lifting gear, stowage planning and port capability into the booking decision. A discharge port that cannot lift the piece is not an option regardless of the rate.
- Cold chain
An unbroken temperature-controlled sequence from origin to destination, with the excursions recorded.
The chain is only as good as its weakest handover, and the handovers (apron, terminal, warehouse door) are where excursions happen. For regulated goods the temperature record is part of the product's release, so a data gap can condemn a consignment that never actually warmed.
SeeReefer
- Container types
The standard equipment range: 20ft and 40ft dry, 40ft high cube, reefer, open top, flat rack and tank.
Equipment choice is a cost decision as much as a fit decision. High cube adds roughly a foot of internal height for a small premium; open top and flat rack unlock oversized cargo but move it into out-of-gauge pricing and handling.
SeeOut-of-gauge,Reefer,Forty-foot Equivalent Unit,Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit
- Dangerous goodsDG
Cargo classified as hazardous in transport and regulated by mode: IMDG at sea, IATA DGR by air, ADR by road in Europe.
The classification, packing, marking and declaration are the shipper's responsibility, and the rules differ by mode, so a consignment approved for sea is not automatically acceptable by air. An undeclared dangerous good is a serious offence, not a paperwork error.
- Dunnage
The bracing, blocking and packing material used to secure cargo inside a container or on a vehicle.
It counts towards gross weight and towards the dimensions a chargeable weight is calculated from, and it is what stops a load shifting. Under-dunnaged cargo that moves in transit is a damage claim the insurer may decline as inadequate packing.
- Gross weight
The total weight of the cargo including all packaging, pallets and dunnage.
The figure freight is charged and aircraft are loaded on. Net weight (the goods alone) appears on the commercial invoice for customs purposes, and confusing the two is a routine source of chargeable weight disputes.
- ISPM 15
The international standard requiring wood packaging in international trade to be heat-treated or fumigated and stamped accordingly.
Non-compliant pallets or crating are refused at the border, and the remedy (re-packing under customs supervision, or re-export) is expensive and slow. Check the stamp before dispatch, not on arrival.
- Out-of-gaugeOOG
Cargo that exceeds the internal dimensions of a standard container and overhangs the equipment carrying it.
Overhang converts a freight booking into a route survey: every bridge, gantry, terminal crane and road bend on the path has to clear the actual loaded dimensions. The measurement that matters is the packed one, including cradles and dunnage.
- Payload
The maximum cargo weight a container or vehicle may legally carry: its rated gross weight less its tare.
Road weight limits at either end are frequently lower than the container's own rating, so the binding constraint is usually the truck rather than the box. Dense cargo hits payload long before it fills the volume.
- Project cargo
A movement of oversized, heavy or multi-part equipment planned as an engineered operation rather than a booking.
Route surveys, lifting studies, permits and delivery sequencing dominate the timeline, and lead times run in months. The freight rate is rarely the largest number on a project move.
- Reefer
A refrigerated container with an integral unit maintaining a set temperature in transit.
It maintains temperature; it does not reduce it. Cargo must be loaded at its carrying temperature, and the gaps in the chain are the plug-out periods at terminals and during drayage, not the sea leg.
- Tare weight
The weight of an empty container or vehicle, stencilled on the container door.
Needed to work out how much cargo a box can legally hold and to calculate the verified gross mass. Tare varies between containers of the same size, so it is read off the actual box rather than assumed.
- UN number
A four-digit identifier assigned to a dangerous substance or article, determining how it must be packed, marked and carried.
It is the first thing asked for on any dangerous goods enquiry, because nothing else can be answered without it: the packing group, the mode restrictions and the segregation requirements all follow from it.
- Unit Load DeviceULD
The pallets and containers that cargo is built onto for loading into an aircraft, shaped to the contour of the hold.
ULD contours are why air freight has height limits that vary by aircraft type and by position in the hold. A consignment that fits a main-deck position on a freighter may not fit the lower hold of a passenger aircraft at all.
A to Z
The whole vocabulary, alphabetically.
Every term above, in one alphabetical list.
Still unclear?
Need help with a term or a charge?
Send us the line from your quote or invoice and our team will explain what it covers and whether it is standard.