Airfreight services
Air freight services, often referred to as air freight or air cargo, plays a crucial role in the global logistics industry and business models. With its remarkable speed and efficiency, air transport has revolutionized the way goods are moved across long distances. In this article, we will explore the advantages and disadvantages of air freight and discuss the air freight operation process.
Advantages
1. High flexibility: As long as there are airports in two places, you can fly routes without being affected by terrains such as mountains, oceans, and deserts. Therefore, the distance of air transportation is much shorter than other modes of transportation, and the aircraft type and route can be adjusted at any time according to the passenger flow or cargo volume.
2. Good safety: The level of security of air transportation is higher than that of railway and sea transportation, and higher than that of road transportation. In recent years, the safety of air transportation has been continuously improved. According to the statistics of the International Civil Aviation Organization, the world's civil aviation scheduled flight crashes, the highest number was 0.44 deaths per 100 million kilometers in 1966, and it has dropped to 0.04 in recent years.
3. Internationalization: Air transport can establish close ties between countries and a worldwide network. For international trade, whether it is a ton of goods or mail, it can be transported from any place in the world at any time, conveniently, safely, economically, and reliably. This is air transportation to international exchanges and human civilization as other transportation methods. An irreplaceable great contribution.
Disadvantages
1. High cost: The air freight shipping cost is very high due to the limited load of the aircraft, the cost of manufacturing the aircraft, and fuel consumption. Therefore, the cost of air transportation is high, leading to high passenger and cargo postal freight, which is only suitable for personnel exchanges, urgently needed materials, and time-sensitive mail, parcels, etc.
2. Limited capacity: Due to the limitation of the load capacity of the aircraft itself, the volume of air cargo is usually much less than that of sea transportation. For example, the largest civil aircraft 8747 all-cargo aircraft has a maximum load of 11 tons, which is tens of thousands of tons compared to sea transportation. There is a big difference between the load capacity of tons and hundreds of thousands of tons.
3. Vulnerable to the weather: The aircraft itself is greatly affected by the weather. In severe weather such as heavy rain, strong wind, fog, etc., flights cannot be effectively guaranteed, which will have a greater impact on air cargo.
Air freight operation process
In general, the operation method of international air transport can be explained in a flow chart: accepting the owner's inquiry → accepting the main cargo entrustment → booking → warehouse → customs declaration → bill of lading confirmation and modification → fee settlement.
1. Accept the owner's inquiry. The consignor’s inquiry needs to provide the following detailed information: destination and departure port airport, gross weight and volume of the goods, shipping time, freight settlement method, and so on.
2. Accept the consignment of the shipper. After the two parties have negotiated all matters, the owner of the goods needs to provide the consignment letter of attorney. After receiving the consignment, the freight forwarder will carefully review the consignment, mainly checking whether the basic information is complete, confirming the time of receipt and delivery, and the method of delivery.
3. Booking. After receiving the entrustment of the shipper, the freight forwarder will select the appropriate route and flight time to book the space with the carrier according to the requirements of the shipper.
4. Into the warehouse. There are two types of warehousing: forwarder picking up and the owner’s delivery. If the owner delivers the goods by himself, the forwarder will provide the goods warehousing notice in advance, informing the warehousing number and delivery address. If you need a forwarder to pick up the goods, you need to provide the pick-up address and pick-up time in advance, confirm the pick-up fee, and then operate.
5. Customs procedures. The cargo owner provides the required information for customs affirmation: the related pressing rundown, receipt, customs announcement force of lawyer, and different archives (at present all traditions the nation over execute paperless statements, and clients need to consent to a paperless arrangement.
6. Confirmation and modification of the bill of lading. The forwarder will need to confirm the accuracy of the contents and information of the bill of lading with the customer, and the bill of lading will be issued when it is confirmed that it is correct. If the contents of the bill of lading need to be modified after this confirmation, a certain fee will be incurred.
7. Expense settlement. The settlement of expenses shall be based on the settlement method agreed upon by both parties. If it is the current settlement method, the owner of the freight shall pay the freight in advance, and then the goods shall be delivered by the carrier. If the two parties sign a monthly settlement agreement, the settlement will be unified according to the settlement time agreed by both parties.
Conclusion
In summary, air freight has both advantages and disadvantages. Both the shipper and the freight forwarder need to follow the steps of the air freight process to successfully complete various tasks in international air transportation and ensure the timely delivery of goods.
As a practitioner of the Belt and Road Initiative and multimodal transport operator, Neptune Logistics has operated many intermodal transport projects with a professional team and rich experience, providing you with quality customer service, affordable prices, and solving related logistics problems. If you want more details about air freight services, feel free to contact us!