Delays caught before the customer calls.
For a Singapore sea, air and courier forwarder with its own customs desk, trucks and warehouse. Carrier emails, customs holds, demurrage clocks and PODs land in one live picture, and AI agents draft the fix for a person to approve.
- 22:40Lumen Line emails a revised schedule for LA-2609Wops@ inbox
- 22:41Finds 14 of our boxes, 6 clients. Colombo connection still safe.Hermes · Ops Desk
- 22:446 client notices drafted, each in that client’s usual channelHermes · Ops Desk
- 07:34Grace approves all 6 from her morning brief on WhatsAppOps manager
- 07:356 clients told. Nobody had to phone the office.Sent + logged
What eats the week
Good ops people, stuck re-keying emails.
Typical for a forwarder moving a few hundred shipments a month. We measure yours in the first two weeks.
- 01
Carrier delays arrive as free-text email
Someone reads the advisory, works out which boxes are on that vessel and phones each client. Half a day later, some still haven’t heard.
~4 hours per advisory - 02
Customs holds found on arrival
A missing import permit is spotted when the box is already held at the terminal. Then the client is chased while the free time runs out.
31h held on one box this week - 03
Free-time clocks nobody watches
Demurrage terms differ by carrier and terminal and live in PDF contracts. Boxes slip past free time by a day before anyone notices.
S$ 205 a day per 40’ - 04
The ops manager is the tracking system
"Where’s my cargo?" calls all day, because the answer sits in one person’s inbox and three WhatsApp groups.
30–40 calls a day - 05
PODs chased before invoices go out
Signed delivery orders stay in the truck cab. Finance can’t bill until the paper turns up, and nobody chases it.
2–5 days to invoice - 06
Quotes rebuilt by hand for every RFQ
Rate sheets, surcharges and last quarter’s price sit in three places. The quote goes out tomorrow, after the client has booked elsewhere.
3–24 hours per quote
What we build
One system from RFQ to paid invoice.
Carrier emails, client chats, driver photos and rate sheets flow into one ops platform. Agents on your own server do the reading and drafting; your team approves.
Comes in from
Goes out as
One shipment, end to end
Enquiry to paid invoice, no gaps.
Follow one 40HC from a WhatsApp RFQ to money in the bank. Flip between today and with the system to see where it breaks and who takes over.
Ops platform
Every vessel, box and dollar on one screen.
A control tower for a forwarder: vessels, the yard, customs, quotes, receivables and crew certs. Click around. Every screen works.
Control tower
Thu 24 Sep · every vessel, box, clock and dollar in one place
South China Sea, weather routing · 15.5 kn, course 222° · Routing around a tropical storm
- Free time ends 15:30 · LMNU 518204 0Harbourline Home · Pasir Panjang · S$ 205/day afterSG 4111 D free 11:40, terminal slot 12:00 open
- Customs hold 31h · TWF-4471Emberline · import permit for Class 3 still missingThird reminder + call script drafted
- Kite Monsoon +14h · KN-2612STropical storm routing · 11 boxes, 5 clients5 client notices drafted
- BL draft not approved · TWF-4498Orchid Lane · sails 02:00 · consignee mismatchAsked at 07:35, no reply yet
- No airline yet · TWF-4512Solace · 212 kg to Frankfurt · cut-off tomorrow 14:00Meridel Air via Dubai saves S$ 148
- Forklift ticket expired · Siti RahmahOn forklift roster Fri · expired 20 SepKelvin Ong is qualified and free Fri
- 09:26Hermes · DocsThird permit reminder for TWF-4471 drafted with a call script
- 09:19Daryl KohApproved QT-6214 · Orchid Lane · S$ 10,940 · sent on WhatsApp
- 09:12Hermes · Ops DeskKite Monsoon +14h read from carrier email · 5 notices drafted
- 09:01Hermes · FinanceMatched S$ 2,740 remittance from Solace to INV-7698
- 08:55Tan Wei MingReturned empty LMNU 509933 7 to the depot
- 08:26Lim Jia HuiConfirmed split delivery for Bayfront (+S$ 180 extra drop)
- 07:35Grace LimApproved 6 delay notices for LA-2609W from WhatsApp
- Answered by bot212
- Handed to staff19
- Complaints4
WhatsApp bot
Clients, drivers and the boss, on WhatsApp.
Tracking answers at 8am, POD photos from the cab, quotes in minutes and a 07:30 brief. A person takes over when price or a complaint comes up.
What the system did
Nothing yet. Send a message on the phone and the actions show up here as they happen.
Workflow automations
Carrier email in, clients told, no re-keying.
Six n8n workflows for a forwarder’s busiest handoffs. Anything client-facing or money-related waits for a person.
Reads the carrier’s schedule change, finds every box on that vessel, and drafts a notice for each client. A person approves before anything goes out.
- Press Execute workflow to run it with sample data. Click any node to see what it does.
Hermes AI agents
Six digital staff who ask first.
They run on Tidewell’s own server, watch the clocks around the day and draft the fix. A person approves every client message, quote, filing and roster change.
Watches every vessel, box and clock, and drafts the fix before anyone asks.
Press Run this agent to watch one of its runs. It will stop and ask you before anything goes out.
- · Read carrier advisories and update ETAs
- · Raise and close exceptions on the control tower
- · Propose trucks and slots for free-time clocks
- · Write the 07:30 brief
- · Any message to a client
- · Rebooking or rolling cargo
- · Changing a truck dispatch
AI 2nd Brain
Every contract and SOP, one question away.
Free-time terms, client rules, past quotes and hold post-mortems in one vault. Ask on WhatsApp and get the answer with its source.
Ask Tidewell Freight anything.
Type a question in the box below, or try one of these. The answers come from this sample company’s files, chats and meeting notes.
Before / after
What changes, in numbers.
Illustrative estimates based on comparable builds. Your numbers depend on volumes and the workflows we automate first.
Rollout
How we would roll this out.
We start with one department and the workflow that costs you the most, prove it works, then expand. Nothing goes live without your sign-off.
- Week 1–201
Map the order-to-cash
We sit with ops, customs and finance, list every inbox, sheet and WhatsApp group, and load carrier contracts, SOPs and rate sheets into the 2nd Brain.
- Week 3–502
Ops desk first
Carrier email → ETA updates, free-time clocks, customs chasers and the control tower. Everything is a draft until you trust it.
- Week 6–803
Quotes, PODs and money
Quote Desk on WhatsApp, POD → invoice, remittance matching and polite reminders, all behind approvals.
- Ongoing04
Run and expand
Client tracking bot, driver job cards, the cert register. A monthly review of what the agents did and what they got wrong.
FAQ
Questions owners ask us.
Do we have to replace our freight system?+
No. If you already run a forwarding system or TMS, we connect to it or read its exports. The ops platform covers what it misses: exceptions, free-time clocks, approvals and the WhatsApp layer.
Will the bot send clients a wrong ETA?+
Client notices are drafted, not sent. A person approves them. Tracking answers only use trusted sources (the carrier’s advisory, ship position and terminal feed) and say which one they used.
Can it file customs declarations?+
No. It reads and checks the documents and prepares the pack. Your licensed declarant reviews and files every declaration and permit.
Our drivers won’t install an app. Is that a problem?+
They don’t need one. Drivers get job cards on WhatsApp and send back POD photos, locations and voice notes for faults. That is all the system needs.
Where do our emails and client data live?+
On a dedicated server that you own, not a shared platform. Access is by role, every agent action is logged with who approved it, and we set it up to meet PDPA.
How soon is it useful?+
The ops desk (ETA updates, free-time clocks and customs chasers) is usually live in weeks 3–5. Most teams feel it in the first week it runs, because the phone rings less.
Other industries
All industries →Next step
See your business in one of these. Then we build it.
Book a 30-minute call. We map one workflow that costs you the most time, show you what it looks like automated, and tell you honestly if it is worth doing.