Freight Audit Is Broken: Real-Time AI Fixes It

Freight audit traditionally involves a monthly batch review of carrier invoices, often uncovering billing mistakes weeks after they occur. This delay makes it difficult to trace the root causes of errors, and by the time they surface, credits have already been issued. Shipium, a supply chain technology company, aims to address this issue with its new AI-driven product, Always On Audit.

Unlike traditional monthly audits, Always On Audit continuously monitors shipments in real-time, comparing each invoice and receipt against a versioned "digital twin" representing the cost expected at the time of shipment. This digital twin is built from the rating and routing decisions Shipium makes upstream. The AI agents run 24/7, scrutinizing every invoice and receipt to catch errors as they happen.

In early beta tests, the system detected a carrier billing base rates instead of contracted rates, causing a customer to lose many thousands of dollars. It also flagged a surcharge applied two days before its contractual start date. The platform's forensic capabilities extend beyond just flagging dollar discrepancies, identifying the lane, dimensioner, station, operator, and data stream responsible for the error.

The system also detects slow-moving drift, such as cost creep on a lane or a shifting carrier mix, before those anomalies grow large enough to require human intervention. Shipium's CEO, Jason Murray, explains that the core problem he observed at Amazon was vendors and carriers receiving chargebacks for errors but lacking the tools to trace and fix the upstream cause. Always On Audit addresses this by automatically attempting corrections and escalating issues to humans only when necessary.

Each human resolution further trains the system to handle similar exceptions autonomously in the future. Shipium reports a typical 12% reduction in parcel transportation costs for its customers. The company reached approximately $100 million in U.S. coverage volume around 2023, the scale needed for its predictive models to outperform carrier-provided estimates. Currently, Always On Audit is rolling out to existing parcel customers, with plans to expand to additional modes and international markets.