CargoAi unveils new payments solution

Air cargo digital enabler CargoAi has made another first move for the industry as the tech company has introduced its integrated payment solution CargoWALLET.

The new feature will allow freight forwarders to make payments for their air cargo shipments directly within the CargoMART booking flow. What’s revolutionary with the payment solution is that it will enable any type of freight forwarder, big or small, to book space for their shipments—and paid for—without an IATA CASS number, without an AWB stock, and without any bank guarantee.

CargoAi said the digital wallet addresses all of these scenarios that used to add more cost and process time that were cumbersome for freight forwarders. CargoWALLET also tackles the needs of medium to large freight forwarders who have an IATA CASS number, but may not have AWB stock with all the carriers due to expensive bank guarantees, or certain airlines still requiring such forwarders to produce bank guarantees.

With this, the company said the entire procurement process from search, quote, booking, and now payment can be done within minutes on the CargoMART interface.

How it works

CargoWALLET is embedded as part of CargoAi’s current booking solutions CargoMART and CargoCONNECT. Once it is activated, users can search airline carriers’ capacities instantly and seamlessly pay for any booking using the digital wallet linked to their company account.

Basic functions found in common digital wallets like ‘Top Up’ , ‘View Account Balance’ and ‘Transaction History’ are all features of CargoWALLET, with transaction fees no more expensive than a bank transfer, the company added.

The project, which started 2 years ago and accelerated with the CargoTech partnership, went through months of successful testing. In the backend, CargoAi said it worked with a ‘large and proven finance provider’ but in an interview with CargoForwarder Global, CEO Matt Petot shared that the company made banking connections with multiple providers to enable an end-to-end finance payment solution with the same cost as bank transfers in more than 30 currencies.

The CEO added that CargoAi also partnered with financial providers to offer financing solutions to facilitate up to 60-day payment terms for freight forwarders in the form of PayLater.

In the same interview, Petot noted that similar air freight marketplaces like WebCargo by Freightos and cargo.one do not offer the same integrated payment solution, whilst financial services like IATA’s CASS and PayCargo are standalone solutions focused on other business cases.

As per partner carriers on CargoAI, the chief said airlines are very receptive to the idea as it allows them to also tap into different freight forwarders who don’t have an IATA CASS account.

“Airlines want to work with as many forwarders as possible, but they sometimes don’t have the resources to work with the long tail of freight forwarders. With our guaranteed solution for the airlines, they only deal with us and can work with all forwarders digitally.”

CargoMART users can already start to request for their free account at an ‘Office Level’ to be registered and activated today.