How to check a carrier or shipper before you work with them

Anyone who works in freight knows the feeling. The load looks good, the price is fair, and you have never heard of the company. Maybe it all goes fine. Or maybe you spend three months chasing an invoice.

The good news is that most bad deals can be avoided with a little checking. You do not need a detective, you need ten minutes.

1. Check that the company exists

It sounds obvious, but start there. Ask for the full company name and its registration or tax number. Look them up in the public registers. If a company avoids giving you these details, you already have your answer.

2. See what others say

The most valuable information is the experience of colleagues who have already worked with that company. Do they pay on time? Does the truck show up when agreed? In the CargoTrust registry you can read reviews from other companies, separately for the shipper role and the carrier role.

3. Ask colleagues when there is nothing to read

If a company has no reviews yet, ask. A short inquiry to colleagues often gets you an answer faster than ten phone calls. Someone has probably hauled for them or given them cargo before.

4. Put the deal in writing

A verbal agreement is fine while everything runs smoothly. When something goes wrong, everyone remembers it differently. Ask for a loading order with the price, the payment term and a contact person. Keep it with the load, not in a chat group where it gets buried.

5. Watch for warning signs

• a price clearly above the market with no obvious reason
• a request for an advance payment from the carrier
• a contact person or phone number that changes at the last minute
• pressure to decide right now, with no time to check

None of these alone means fraud. But if you see two or three together, stop and check again.

In short

Ten minutes of checking costs less than one unpaid invoice. A registry, colleagues' experience and documents in one place make that job much easier, and that is why we built CargoTrust.