Container tracking automation
Stop bleeding money
on demurrage charges.
Automated container tracking and last-free-day alerts
for drayage operators and freight forwarders.
The charges don't wait.
Your team does.
Demurrage at major North American ports runs $150 to $400 per container per day, starting the moment your free time runs out. One missed container sitting four extra days costs you up to $1,600. Do that a few times a month and it adds up fast.
Your team is logging into MSC, Maersk, Evergreen, COSCO, and Hapag-Lloyd every morning, manually checking 50, 80, 120 containers. One gets missed. Then another. By the time the invoice arrives, the container left days ago and there's nothing to dispute.
Your people are working hard. The problem is the system makes them do something a machine should handle. Container statuses don't update on a schedule and free days don't wait for your morning meeting. You need something watching at all hours.
Automated vigilance.
Zero portal logging.
Portbound Ops watches your containers around the clock and sends the right information to where your team already works.
Real-time alerts in Slack or email
When a container status changes, we send an alert to your Slack channel or inbox right away. Available, held, approaching last free day. No manual checking on your end.
Last-free-day countdowns
Every tracked container gets a last-free-day countdown. We flag it at 72, 48, and 24 hours out so dispatch has time to act before free time expires.
Email-forward intake
Forward booking confirmations and arrival notices to your Portbound inbox. We pull out the container numbers automatically. No portal access or manual data entry needed.
Weekly summary reports
Every Monday a summary hits your inbox: containers tracked, alerts sent, demurrage avoided. A simple number your ops team can point to.
What you'll actually
see every day.
Container number, status, days remaining, location. Everything dispatch needs, nothing extra.
Live alerts in your team's Slack channel. Overdue containers in red, available ones in green.
Your week, in numbers.
Every Monday morning a short summary hits your inbox. How many containers we tracked, how many demurrage warnings went out, and a rough estimate of what you avoided in charges. No dashboard to check, no login required.
Built for the people
moving freight.
Drayage operators
- You're pulling containers from LA, Long Beach, Oakland, Houston, and Savannah, often for a dozen or more shippers at the same time.
- Every extra day at the terminal costs you driver time and margin. You need to know which ones to pull first.
- Portbound puts your most urgent containers at the top every morning so dispatch can make the right calls before penalties start.
- Designed for teams tracking 30 to 300+ containers at any given time.
Freight forwarders
- You're juggling shipments across multiple carriers and booking references, for clients who expect you to already know what's happening.
- When demurrage hits on the consignee side, it lands on you. Catching it early protects the client relationship and your margin.
- Forward us the booking confirmations. We track everything. You take the client call with answers ready.
- Works with Maersk, MSC, Evergreen, COSCO, Hapag-Lloyd, ONE, and other major carriers.
Common questions,
straight answers.
A short call is all it takes. We set up a forwarding address for your team's email, connect a Slack webhook if you want alerts there, and go over which carriers and ports you work with. Most customers are live within 48 hours.
No. You forward booking confirmations and arrival notices to an email address we give you. We pull the container numbers and start tracking. Alerts come back to you in Slack or email. No new software to learn, no portal to check every morning.
We cover all major carriers. If you have active shipments we're not tracking yet, just send us the booking or container numbers and we'll add them within the hour. Need a carrier we don't have yet? That usually takes a day or two.
When a container gets a last-free-day alert and is picked up before free time runs out, we count it as an avoided charge. We use published tariff rates for the carrier and port. We keep the number conservative and only count it if the alert went out in time and the container was actually retrieved.
Pricing is based on your container volume. We've kept it well below the cost of a single demurrage charge, so the math is usually pretty straightforward. Get in touch and we'll send you a quote.
A 30-minute call and a forwarding rule on your email. Most customers are getting live alerts within 48 hours. If you need a carrier we don't have set up yet, give it about a week. We take care of the setup.
No long-term contracts. Email us and we'll offboard you cleanly. We'd rather keep you because it's working than because you're locked in.
Ready to stop
the bleeding?
Tell us a bit about your operation and we'll show you what this looks like for your volume.
[email protected]