Delays in Accessorials, Detention, and POD Collection are Costing You

Nearly Sixty days ago, Augment raised $25 million to build Augie—an AI teammate for freight operators, like Christina, who spend too much of their day buried in emails, document requests, and status checks.

Since then, Augie has been deployed across carriers and brokerages managing over $20 billion in freight—radically transforming dozens of workflows that used to eat into margin but are now a strategic advantage for the firm.

Today, we’re zooming in on one of the under-appreciated drags on cash flow and margin: document collection.

Let’s start with Christina.

The Morning Bottleneck

6:30 AM. Christina logs into her TMS. Three shipments are marked “Delivered.” None have Proof of Delivery.

She needs PODs, lumper receipts, detention slips—without them, she can’t invoice. And without invoices, there’s no cash flow. But before she can even send a follow-up email, she’s pulled into a dispatch issue, an urgent claim, and a new carrier to onboard.

By the time she returns to billing, it’s 3 PM. The freight has moved. But the money hasn’t.

For Christina—and for every ops team out there—missing documents are more than an administrative delay. They stall payment, tie up working capital, and silently erode margin.

They’re also a drain on morale. Christina didn’t join the industry to chase paperwork—she came to play a critical role in keeping freight moving across the country. She wants to solve real problems, not tackle mundane tasks.

What One Missing Document Really Costs

A single shipment may need half a dozen documents to close the loop. At a minimum, the Proof of Delivery (POD) is required. More often, it’s also lumper receipts, detention invoices, layover charges, and more—collectively called accessorials. These documents validate charges and trigger payment. But collecting them? Still a heavily manual chase.

And the longer they’re missing, the worse it gets:

• Customers can’t be billed

• Carriers can’t be paid

• Lending partners won’t advance funds

• Revenue stays stuck in limbo

If you’re running a brokerage with 4% margins, that means a $2000 load gets you $80 in gross margin. But a 7-day delay—at a 10% annual interest rate—costs you $3.84 in interest. That’s 5% of your gross margin—gone.

Now multiply that across 1,000 loads a week.

The Freight Chain Is Long—And Documentation Ties It Together

Every shipment touches five or more entities: shippers, brokers, carriers, facilities, and lenders. Each one needs documents to reconcile.

Yet today, all that paper—PODs, receipts, accessorials—is still tracked down by ops teams who are also managing pickups, equipment, claims, and customer issues.

No wonder things slip. And when they do, everyone feels the strain: operators, finance, customers, and carriers.

Brokers Are Built for Freight—Not Chasing Paper

Most brokers pay carriers in 7 to 14 days—but get paid by shippers in 30 to 60. That cash flow gap is bridged by credit or factoring partners. But neither moves until documents are clean and verified.

When paperwork lags, capital stalls. The brokerage floats payments, relationships get strained, and operators scramble to plug the gaps.

Every call, every email, every resend—it’s margin bleeding from a thousand paper cuts.

Why Upload Links and Email Templates Haven’t Solved It

Portals. Reminders. Templates. Brokerages have tried it all.

But these tools depend on already-busy carriers to engage, respond, and upload. When they don’t, your ops team becomes a glorified document collector.

Delays pile up. Cash gets tight. Revenue takes longer to realize.

Augie Automates the Chase—And Closes the Loop

Augie is a freight-native AI teammate that takes document collection off your plate—end to end.

No reminders. No portals. No missed emails.

Augie works inside your existing tools and processes, reaching out by text, email, phone or telegram —whatever works—to gather, verify, and route documents automatically.

And because it’s built to learn, Augie remembers the best contact at every carrier—not just who responded last. When dispatchers change (which happens often), Augie detects it, confirms the update, and adjusts automatically in your TMS. The next time you need a POD or lumper receipt? Augie already knows who to ask—and how.

No tribal knowledge. No wasted time.

Augie understand if the loads have detention, lumper or layovers and requests those documents to make sure billing can start on time; every time.

Augie can flag other discrepancies like load numbers not being correct.

Augie looks inside the documents to make sure they are signed; and for the right load number. So your finance team does not have to find out that what they got was not good enough.

Augie updates your TMS and connects directly to your invoice auditing system so there are no delays in invoicing once the document. Why wait when you can get paid!

Most importantly - operators like Christina are freed up for more margin-generating work - like generating new contracts, negotiating better rates, and more.

What Augie’s Already Delivered

In just 60 days since launch, Augie has:

• Collected documents tied to billions in freight

• Cut invoice delay by over 40%

• Accelerated billing by as much as 8 days

• Protected over $4 in margin per load

• Achieved 78% POD collection within 72 hours

Now: Christina’s 6:30 AM Looks Different

Today, three shipments are marked Delivered—and missing docs.

But Christina doesn’t flinch. Augie is already on it—texting dispatchers, validating documents, and routing them to billing. She moves on to the day’s real priorities.

No delays. No guesswork. No margin left on the table.

From Delivered to Dollars—Faster

Brokers and Carriers are under pressure to do more with less. Shippers demand fast, accurate reconciliation. Capital partners need verified documentation.

Augie makes that possible. Faster, easier, and more reliably than ever before.

Let’s Fix the Delay

If you’re ready to:

• Cut DSO and improve cash flow

• Give your ops team real time back

• Reduce friction with carriers and customers

• Protect your margins

👉 Book a demo to see how Augie transforms document collection from a bottleneck into a competitive advantage.