Every day, businesses and individuals are shipping things from one place to another. The shipments may travel across the country or they may have to move internationally. Freight forwarding companies are often the people that are responsible for the storing and the shipping of the things that people and businesses want.
The logistics involved in moving freight can be very difficult to manage. In the end, all that the businesses and people that utilize freight forwarding services care about is they are able to get their items from one place to another when they want to and for the price they find acceptable. They do not always care about how it is done, they only want to get it done.
In order to accomplish this, it is common to look for a freight broker. The Freight broker agents job is to connect the people that need to have freight shipped with the companies that will do it. That may sound easy, but the actual role of the freight broker’s agent is much more complex. The stress that is involved in the job can help explain why it is easy to find companies that have a freight broker agents opening in their company.
The freight broker is actively involved in the shipment that is being made. They may or may not ever actually see the shipment, but that does not mean they are not always thinking about it. Some of the things they are responsible for include:
- Tracking the shipment – The broker agent needs to know where the shipment is at all times. It does not matter how the product is being shipped, but land, sea or air, the agent should know where it is at any time.
- Coordinating the shipment – A shipment may use several differ methods of transportation. The broker’s agent needs to coordinate these so the shipment is kept in transit or arrange for storage while waiting for the shipment to change from one mode of transportation to another.
- Storage of shipment – If the shipment needs to be stored at any time, the agent is responsible for making these arrangements.
- Paperwork – Shipping products requires paperwork, permits and many other things. The agent needs all of these things in place so the shipment is not delayed.
- Satisfactory delivery – The process ends when the shipment is delivered and when it has passed the customer’s inspection.
The combination of all of these things is why the freight brokers agent job is never done.