How to fill in the Basic Information of a Customer Shipment

Fill in the Basic Information tab of a Customer Shipment (CS) — the General, Shipment, Partner Sender and Partner Receiver sections, which fields are required, the Movement Type, Incoterm, Service Trade and HBL Type options, the confirmed dates that come from the Shipping Order, the HBL number, Total Invoices and the Business Unit lock.

Updated 11/7/2026

The Basic Information tab is the framework of a Customer Shipment (CS): the route, the service, the incoterm, the house bill details, the dates and the parties. This article goes through its four sections — General, Shipment, Partner Sender and Partner Receiver — field by field. Creating the CS itself is covered in How to create a CS (customer shipment) in Freightools.

Before you start

Open the CS from Shipments → Customer Shipments with the pencil in the Edit column, or create one with New Customer Shipment.
Required fields carry a *. An empty required field shows the tooltip "This field is required. Please fill it in."
Choose the Service Mix first. Service Type is filled from it, and Pickup Service and Delivery Service have no options until a Service Mix is chosen.

A Customer Shipment open on the Basic Information tab, showing the General and Shipment sections.

General

Field	What to enter
Is Master	Tick for a master CS.
Service Mix *	The mode and load type, for example Ocean FCL or Air Service. Locked after the CS is saved.
Sales User	The salesperson for the shipment.
Country From and Country To	The countries of origin and destination.
Address Info	Free text about the addresses.
Movement Type	House-House, House-Pier, Pier-House or Pier-Pier.
Created	Read-only: the date the CS was created.
Expiration *	Starts at one month after creation on a new CS.
Execution User	The person running the shipment. Starts as the user who creates the CS.
Ready To Load	When the cargo is ready.
Free Demurrage Origin and Free Demurrage Destination	The free demurrage at each end.
Comment and Critical Comment	Notes on the shipment.
Customs Operator	The customs partner. Inactive partners are marked [NOT ACTIVE].
Customs Broker Contact Email	The customs broker's email.
Accrual Date	The accrual date you set. Calculated Accrual Date beside it is read-only.
Business Unit	The business unit the shipment belongs to.
Tags	Labels for the shipment.

The Business Unit lock

Business Unit is locked once an approved invoice is bound to the CS. Set it correctly before invoicing.

Shipment

Field	What to enter
Incoterm *	(EXW) Ex Works, (FCA) Free Carrier, (FAS) Free Alongside Ship, (FOB) Free On Board, (CFR) Cost and Freight, (CIF) Cost, Insurance and Freight, (CPT) Carriage Paid To, (CIP) Carriage and Insurance Paid To, (DAT) Delivered at Terminal, (DAP) Delivered at Place, (DDP) Delivered Duty Paid, (DPU) Delivered at Place Unloaded.
Service Type *	Read-only, filled from the Service Mix (for example Ocean).
Service Trade *	Export, Import, Domestic or Cross.
Pickup Service and Delivery Service	For example Full Container Load. Locked after the CS is saved.
Boarding Frequency	How often the service sails or departs.
HBL Type	Original, Waybill or Telex.
HBL	The house bill number. On an Air CS the field is labelled HAWB.
Shipping Documents	Free text.
Total Invoices	The number of invoices, with a + button.
Total Master Docs	The number of master documents.
Transaction Number	The carrier transaction number.
Equipment Name	The vessel, chosen from a list; Define New adds one.
Voyage and Transit Time	The voyage number and the transit time.
Estimated Cut Off, Estimated Departure, Estimated Arrival	Your estimated dates.
Confirmed Pick-up, Confirmed Departure, Confirmed Arrival, Confirmed Delivery	Read-only.

Confirmed dates come from the Shipping Order

The four Confirmed dates cannot be typed on the CS: they are filled from the Shipping Order (SO). To change them, work on the SO. See SO Dates, Stages & Tracking in Freightools.

Get the next HBL number

A refresh icon beside HBL (or HAWB) fetches the next number from your number range. Number ranges are set up by your Freightools administrator — see How to Manage Number Ranges in Freightools.

See the invoices on the CS

The + button beside Total Invoices has the tooltip "Define New" and works on a saved CS. It opens the Invoices dialog, with Add Invoice and the columns Edit, Number, Issued Date, Issued By, Currency, ROE, Value, Payment and Files. Close it with the X.

The same dialog opens from Invoices in the menu on the Process Steps tab. See How to issue a selling invoice from a shipment file.

The Invoices dialog opened from the plus button beside Total Invoices, with Add Invoice and the invoice columns.

Track the cargo

When a cargo query view is available, a globe icon beside Transaction Number opens it.

Partner Sender

Field	What to enter
Customer	Your customer on the sending side. You can create or edit the partner from the field.
Contact	The customer's contact.
Customer Reference	The customer's own reference.
Shipper	The physical shipper. You can create or edit the partner from the field.
Sales Agent	The sales agent, with Define New and a copy-to-clipboard icon.

Partner Receiver

Field	What to enter
Customer	Your customer on the receiving side.
Contact	The customer's contact.
Customer Reference	The customer's own reference.
Forwarder	The forwarder on the receiving side.
Consignee	The physical consignee.
Notify	The notify party.
Carrier	The carrier, with a copy-to-clipboard icon and Edit.

Customer is your contractual customer on each side; Shipper and Consignee are the physical cargo parties. They can be different companies. The two Customer Reference values appear on the Customer Shipments list as SENDER and RECEIVER.

Save your changes

Click Update to save and close the editor. The icon-only Apply Changes button sits beside it.

If something goes wrong

You see	What to do
Pickup Service or Delivery Service has no options	Choose the Service Mix first.
Service Mix, Pickup Service or Delivery Service cannot be changed	They are locked once the CS is saved.
Business Unit cannot be changed	An approved invoice is bound to the CS.
A Confirmed date cannot be typed	Confirmed dates come from the SO.
The + beside Total Invoices is not available on a new CS	It works on a saved CS. Save the CS first.
A customs partner shows [NOT ACTIVE]	The partner is inactive. Choose an active one, or ask your Freightools administrator.