Should a forwarder buy quoting software or hire a pricing coordinator?
For a freight forwarder, it depends on where quoting stalls. Quoting software fits when rates sit in scattered sheets and every quote is assembled by hand. A pricing coordinator fits when each quote needs a person's judgement on margin and cargo. Having the workflow built, by an independent builder, such as Alea Applied AI, fits when rate requests wait in the inbox, carrier rates are chased by hand and quotes are never followed up.
Updated
How do the three options compare?
Prices are the ones each company published on 25 October 2026. Wages are medians from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the UK's Office for National Statistics (ONS). Each cell is a summary: the detail and the qualifiers are below.
| Compared on | Buy quoting software | Hire a pricing coordinator | Have it built |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | Quotiss: 125 dollars a user a month, for at least two users. CargoAi, for air cargo: a free plan, then from 169 a month for one office, billed annually, in euros to a visitor in Europe and dollars to one elsewhere. Freightify's pricing page prints no price. | No official wage for the title. Nearest BLS median, May 2025: 52,260 dollars a year for cargo and freight agents. Nearest ONS median in the UK, April 2026: 35,618 pounds for transport and distribution clerks and assistants. Employer costs come on top. | A review of about a week, then a build quoted at a fixed price before it starts. |
| Time to live | Neither Quotiss's nor Freightify's pricing page gives a setup time; CargoAi's says a forwarder can start free in minutes. Quotiss includes onboarding and training in its standard pricing. | The time it takes to recruit and train one person. | A review of about a week, then a first working version usually live in two to four weeks. |
| Covers | Quotiss: rates, quotes, CRM and analytics in one platform. CargoAi: air cargo rates and bookings, with a shipper quotation module from its Premium plan. Freightify: rate search, rate management and quotations. | The rate requests one person can price, chase and follow up in working hours. | Each rate request from the inbox to a quote drafted in your system, with the carrier rates chased and every unconverted quote followed up. |
| Leaves with you | Setting it up, keeping the rates in it current unless the plan does that, and every rate request that never reaches it. | Recruitment, training, supervision, cover for absence, and the hours the person does not work. | Agreeing the acceptance criteria, and the cases the rules pass to a named person. |
What does each option cost, and what does it cover?
Each option is described from its own published pages, read on 25 October 2026, in the currency the page prints, and closes on when it fits.
Buy quoting software
Quoting software holds the rates and builds the quote from them. Quotiss, which puts rates, quotes, CRM and analytics in one platform, lists its Small teams plan at 125 dollars a user a month, with a minimum of two users; teams of ten or more get reduced per-user pricing and larger organisations a custom price, and the page prints neither figure. An annual subscription paid up front comes with a discount whose size the page does not give, onboarding and training are included, and Quotiss says there is no fee per quote or per shipment. CargoAi, an air cargo platform for forwarders, prints its prices in euros to a visitor in Europe and in dollars to one elsewhere, with the same figures in both: a free plan, then Pro at 169 a month, with its rate management system and five users, Premium at 249, with its shipper quotation module and thirty users, and Ultimate at 349, with CargoBridge, its integration with your TMS, all billed annually and each for one office. Freightify's pricing page lists three plans, Essentials, Essentials+ and Enterprise, each with a button to contact sales and no price; Essentials is for up to five users in one country, Essentials+ lists rate upload as a service, the free trial gives seven days of its rate search, and Enterprise lists integration with your TMS, MDM and CRM and a professional services implementation led by an industry expert. Neither Quotiss's nor Freightify's pricing page gives a setup time; CargoAi's says a forwarder can start free in minutes. This route fits when the rates sit in scattered sheets and every quote is assembled by hand.
Hire a pricing coordinator
Pricing coordinator is not a title either statistics office reports. It is absent from the index of BLS's Occupational Outlook Handbook, which files a freight clerk and a shipping order clerk under material recording clerks. The Handbook lists cargo and freight agents among the occupations it does not cover in detail, defines the work as including preparing and examining bills of lading to determine shipping charges and tariffs, and links that occupation to O*NET's title for freight forwarders. We take cargo and freight agents as the nearest occupation, and the choice is ours. BLS puts the median annual wage, in May 2025, at 52,260 dollars for cargo and freight agents and 47,600 for material recording clerks. Benefits come on top: BLS's employer cost figures for June 2026 put them at 11.51 dollars an hour worked for office and administrative support staff in private industry, the group under which the Handbook lists cargo and freight agents, against 25.22 in wages and salaries. In the UK the title is absent from ONS's coding index of occupations too, which files a freight forwarder and a forwarding clerk under transport and distribution clerks and assistants, and a rates and charges officer in transport under estimators, valuers and assessors. We take transport and distribution clerks and assistants as the nearest in the UK, and that choice is ours too. In Employee earnings in the UK: 2026, published on 22 October 2026, ONS's provisional figures for April 2026 put median gross annual pay, for full-time employees a year or more in the job, at 35,618 pounds for transport and distribution clerks and assistants and 41,372 for estimators, valuers and assessors. Employer costs come on top: GOV.UK gives employer National Insurance for 2026 to 2027 as 15 percent on earnings above 5,000 pounds a year for category letter A, less an Employment Allowance of up to 10,500 pounds for eligible employers, and the minimum employer pension contribution under automatic enrolment as 3 percent, in most schemes on earnings between 6,240 and 50,270 pounds a year. This route fits when each quote needs a person's judgement on the margin, the cargo and the customer.
Have it built
An independent builder builds the quoting workflow across what you already run: the shared inbox, the rate sheets and the forwarding system. That is our work. Each rate request is captured and triaged the moment it arrives, the rates it needs are pulled from where they live and the missing ones chased from carriers on a schedule, and the quote is drafted in your format inside the forwarding software you already run, CargoWise, Descartes, ASM Sequoia, Destin8, BoxTop and Magaya among them. A person checks and sends every quote, and every quote that has not converted is followed up. It starts with a review, about a week: for a forwarder, the Quote Response Audit, which measures turnaround and win rate on your own quotes. The build is then quoted at a fixed price, against acceptance criteria written before it starts. This route fits when rate requests wait in the inbox, carrier rates are chased by hand and quotes go out without a follow-up.
What do we do, and on what terms?
We build and run the system inside the software your forwarding business already uses. It starts with a review, about a week, that finds where requests and documents stall and what each fix is worth. The build is then scoped and quoted at a fixed price, and a first working version is usually live in two to four weeks: one client journey, live in your systems, against a written baseline. The acceptance criteria are written before any build begins: what the system will do, measured how, by when. If it misses, the fix is ours. After that we run and extend it, monthly, and you can cancel at any time.
How do you decide?
- Find where quoting stalls before you buy anything. Requests that wait in the inbox are a capture problem, rates that take an afternoon to find are a rate management problem, and quotes that go out and are never chased are a follow-up problem.
- Check what you already pay for. Ask the vendor of your forwarding software what it already does with rates and quotes before you buy a second system to hold them.
- Match the tool to your modes. CargoAi's pricing page describes an air cargo platform; Freightify's Essentials plan includes ocean rate search and lists air rate search as an add-on; Quotiss says it can connect your rates, quoting, customer management and analytics across your freight modes.
- Cost the person in full: the wage, the employer's costs on top, and the time to recruit and train.
- Decide who owns it. Software needs someone to keep the rates current, a coordinator needs someone to supervise, and a built system needs acceptance criteria that somebody in the business agreed.
- Measure first. Turnaround and win rate on your own quotes show which part is slow; the review measures both before anything is built.
When are we the wrong choice?
- If the forwarding software you already pay for can quote from your rates and nobody has set it up, start there: that is a configuration job, not a build
- If what you need is carrier rates and quotes in one search, buy the software: that is what it is for
- If each quote is a negotiation that needs a person from the first line, hire the person
- If you receive only a handful of rate requests a week, a tidy manual process is fine, and we will say so
- If you are about to change forwarding systems, wait until that settles rather than building twice
Frequently asked questions
Should a forwarder buy quoting software or hire a pricing coordinator?
It depends on where quoting stalls. Quoting software fits when the rates sit in scattered sheets and every quote is assembled by hand, and a pricing coordinator fits when each quote needs a person's judgement on the margin and the cargo. Having the workflow built fits when rate requests wait in the inbox, carrier rates are chased by hand and quotes are never followed up, and it runs inside the forwarding software you already use.
How much does freight quoting software cost?
On 25 October 2026 Quotiss's pricing page listed the Small teams plan at 125 dollars a user a month, with a minimum of two users, and printed no price for larger teams. CargoAi, an air cargo platform, listed a free plan, then Pro at 169 a month, Premium, with its shipper quotation module, at 249 and Ultimate at 349, each for one office and all billed annually, in euros to a visitor in Europe and in dollars to one elsewhere. Freightify's pricing page printed no price: each of its three plans carried a button to contact sales.
How much does a pricing coordinator cost a forwarder?
There is no official wage for the title. The BLS median annual wage in May 2025 was 52,260 dollars for cargo and freight agents, the occupation we take as the nearest, and BLS put benefits for office and administrative support staff in private industry at 11.51 dollars an hour worked in June 2026, against 25.22 in wages and salaries. In the UK, ONS's coding index files a freight forwarder under transport and distribution clerks and assistants, the group we take as the nearest, and ONS's provisional median gross annual pay for full-time employees in that group was 35,618 pounds in April 2026, before employer National Insurance and pension.
Does quoting software connect to CargoWise or Magaya?
Ask each vendor which forwarding system it connects to and who maintains the connection. CargoAi's enterprise page says CargoMART, its platform, connects to your TMS through CargoBridge, including a turnkey integration with CargoWise, and its pricing page lists CargoBridge on the Ultimate plan; Quotiss's integrations page says quote data can be transferred from Quotiss to your booking system, without naming one; Freightify's pricing page lists integration with your TMS, MDM and CRM on its Enterprise plan. A built workflow runs inside the system you already use: we build on top of CargoWise, Descartes, ASM Sequoia, Destin8, BoxTop and Magaya.
Can a forwarder use more than one of these?
Yes. They cover different parts of a quote: the software holds the rates and builds the quote, the coordinator brings the judgement, and a built workflow carries each request from the inbox to a drafted quote in your system and follows it up. Whichever you choose, measure turnaround and win rate first, so you know which part is slow.
What does it cost to have quoting built?
It starts with a review, about a week: for a forwarder, the Quote Response Audit, which measures turnaround and win rate on your own quotes and shows the fix on a real rate request of yours. The build is then scoped and quoted at a fixed price, against acceptance criteria written before it starts: what the system will do, measured how, by when. If it misses, the fix is ours.
Sources
Every statement on this page about a named company, a price, a wage or a rule was read at its source on 25 October 2026. Prices, wages and policies change: read them again before you rely on them.
- Quotiss: pricing
- Quotiss: integrations
- CargoAi: pricing for forwarders
- CargoAi: enterprise platform, TMS integration
- Freightify: plans and pricing
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Occupational Outlook Handbook, A to Z index
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Occupational Outlook Handbook, data for occupations not covered in detail
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics: material recording clerks, Occupational Outlook Handbook
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026, Table 4, private industry by occupational group
- Office for National Statistics: Employee earnings in the UK: 2026
- Office for National Statistics: the data behind Figure 5 of that bulletin, annual full-time earnings by occupation
- Office for National Statistics: SOC 2020 Volume 2, the coding index
- GOV.UK: rates and thresholds for employers 2026 to 2027
- GOV.UK: workplace pensions, what you, your employer and the government pay
See where the time is going
Book a private review. On a short call we map where work is getting stuck in your firm and whether there is a system worth building. No pitch, and if there is nothing there worth doing, we will say so.