TIACA launches new air cargo rating platform: CSQ

Before making plans for dinner, you probably vet restaurants you’re considering with a visit to Yelp. Why shouldn’t you do the same thing when it comes to airfreight?

The International Air Cargo Association (TIACA) is trying to give shippers that option through an initiative launched yesterday at its 2017 Executive Summit in Miami. The initiative, an online Cargo Service Quality (CSQ) tool, would be rolled out in 2018 as an open platform for customer ratings of services across the air cargo supply chain. The platform would cover all links in the supply chain from forwarders to airports to ground handlers.

CSQ comes in the midst of a flurry of online platforms meant to provide greater transparency to air cargo logistics. Last month, Cargo iQ announced [add link to new word] announcement that its members would receive real-time access to data that would let them compare their performance with the rest of the Cargo iQ community. Freightos also said recently that it will adopt dynamic pricing for cargo on its platform.

Participants in the CSQ program will be able to fill out an online form to assess the quality of airfreight services either every quarter or every six months, and see them published semi-annually in TIACA Times. During the program’s pilot phase, assessments will focus on airports and cargo terminal operators before expanding to other segments of the supply chain.