Unisys Web portal offers 30-day advance booking for CPS members
Unisys-operated Cargo Portal Services (CPS), an electronic booking and shipment management service for the air cargo industry, said Wednesday it now offers 30-day advance booking on all CPS member carriers.
The company said that freight forwarders will now have visibility of both confirmed and queued bookings and will able to view the status of their shipments via the portal.
A booking window is the time before a flight when an airline allows forwarders to book space. This generally varies from seven to 30 days before departure, depending on the carrier. For forwarders making regular bookings each month, dealing with a variety of policies can be hard, Unisys said in a statement.
'The 30-day booking capability standardizes the booking process across all of the CPS carriers,' said Scott Dolan, president of United Cargo, in a statement. 'The burden of remembering when a booking can be made on which carrier has been removed. With this feature, forwarders can now enter their bookings for the time frame that meets their needs within this 30-day booking period.'
When a forwarder makes bookings using the CPS Template or 'Create Multiple Bookings' functions, the system automatically sorts them into two groups. Those bookings for carriers with an open booking window are processed immediately while the others are held until the appropriate booking window opens and are then automatically sent. Forwarders have visibility of booking status and those that are being held will be shown as queued.