Ship it right the first time.
Choosing a service, packing a pallet, measuring correctly, and preparing paperwork — the fundamentals that decide whether freight arrives on time and on budget.
Choose the right shipment type
The cheapest option is rarely the smallest one. Match the service to the load and the deadline.
Parcel
Single cartons under about 70 lb (32 kg).
Fastest to book and cheapest for small, non-palletised goods travelling to a single address.
Pallet & LTL
One to six pallets, or anything too heavy for parcel.
Your freight shares a trailer with other shipments. Cost-effective, with one or two extra transfers.
FTL
Roughly ten pallets or more, or high-value freight.
The whole trailer is yours. Fewer handoffs means faster transit and a lower damage risk.
Container
International ocean freight, FCL or LCL.
A 20ft or 40ft container on a scheduled sailing, with customs handled before the box gates in.
Pack and measure for the road
Most freight damage and most billing surprises trace back to the same two things: how the load was built, and how it was measured.
Dimensional weight, quickly
Carriers bill on whichever is greater: actual weight, or volume converted to weight. For imperial parcel freight that conversion is length × width × height in inches, divided by 139.
48 × 40 × 52 in ÷ 139 ≈ 718 lb billable
Build the pallet properly
Keep cartons inside the pallet footprint, heaviest at the bottom, and stretch-wrap from the base up so the load and pallet move as one unit.
Label every piece
One label per carton, on the top and one side. If a shipment splits across a transfer, unlabelled pieces are the ones that go missing.
Measure after wrapping
Carriers bill on the wrapped, palletised dimensions — including any overhang. Measure the finished unit, not the cartons.
Declare the real weight
Reweighs are the most common source of an invoice that does not match the quote. Round up rather than guessing low.
Get the paperwork ahead of the freight
Documents prepared before dispatch are the difference between a container that clears and a container that sits.
Bill of Lading (BOL)
The contract of carriage and receipt. Issued at pickup for every road shipment.
Commercial invoice
Required for international freight. States value, commodity, and terms of sale.
Packing list
Piece counts, weights, and contents per carton — used at customs and at delivery.
Certificate of origin
Needed on many trade lanes to establish where the goods were manufactured.
This guide is general shipping guidance for the FreightBridge Logistics prototype and is not legal, customs, or tax advice. Requirements vary by lane, commodity, and country.
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