Ocean freight e-commerce platform INTTRA has announced the availability of INTTRA Link 2.0, the first release in a series being delivered on its new Booking 2.0 portal environment.

'After seven years and having successfully facilitated the booking of over 10m containers for thousands of customers, INTTRA has made extensive enhancements to its booking product line in order to create the next generation suite of tools for ocean shipping,' the company said in a press release.

In cooperation with INTTRA's 23 member carriers, along with the input of many of its customers, the group says it can now offer a new standard for the booking of containerised freight.

Updates to the portal include extending support for export and import haulage, full transport plans, specialised cargo details (hazmat, out of gauge, and atmospheric control) and regional process support.

INTTRA Link Booking 2.0 is INTTRA's EDI-enabled environment, used by shippers and freight forwarders to reserve space on ocean going vessels.

According to the company, INTTRA Link Booking 2.0 leverages advancements in carrier system capabilities and drives even further improvements based on requests from shippers around the world.

'This has the earmark of being an industry changing event as shippers and carriers have come together to architect this new e-commerce platform for the shipping industry,' commented Ivan Latanision, vice-president of product management.

Key enhancements found in INTTRA Link Booking 2.0 include:

Dangerous Cargo Details: Significant expansion of information handling capability of dangerous goods. Drawing interest from the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, the transaction extension covers the key data elements in a typical hazardous declaration, and in some cases completely eliminates the need for parallel processes required for hazardous shipments.

Cargo Requiring Temperature and Atmospheric Controls: Expands the settings available to configure temperature and atmosphere controlled containers. There is now greater capability for a shipper to dictate detailed instructions ensuring safety of their temperature sensitive cargo.

Container-level Haulage Support: Breaking the barrier of shipment-level only details, a shipper can now request per-container level specifics associated with empty container positioning, multiple pickup and multi-stop export haulage arrangements. In regions where it is common practice, carriers can also provide container-level release numbers in a multi-container booking.

Split Bookings: Introduces the ability to handle carrier split bookings. Carriers can split a multi-container booking request into two or more discrete bookings to align with actual container space available on a vessel. Each split booking has its own INTTRA reference number. In the INTTRA portal, split bookings are linked to their predecessors using the key information provided by the customer during incoming booking transactions.

'INTTRA has always prided itself on providing the most innovative solutions to the ocean transport industry,' said Ken Bloom, president and CEO of INTTRA. 'INTTRA Link Booking 2.0 embodies our continued dedication to not only supply new solutions to the industry, but also to remain dedicated to improving our existing product line in order to meet customer needs and the increased necessity for visibility into the supply chain.'

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