NetCourier

OVERALL USER GUIDE

This guide is designed to help users of the NetCourier portal no matter what level they are at. From requesting access to first-time logins to performing quotes and booking consignments, this guide will show you what to do. If you’d like to speak to one of our consultants directly you can call us on +27(0)86177 79 13 or click on the Contact Us button on this page and someone will get back to you asap.

What do you need help with?

Welcome to the Logging In guide. In order to gain access to the NetCourier Client Portal someone at Freight Innovations must have already added you as a user under your specific account/company. They will send your login details via email. If you need a password reset for any reason please contact us.

Do you have a NetCourier Access Code, Username and Password?

Log In Process

Step 1: Navigate to the NetCourier Portal Login Page

There are 2 ways to access the NetCourier Client Portal.

Directly:
- Go to https://freightinnovations.netcourier.net/metafour-auth/authenticate
Via the Freight Innovations website:
- Go to freight-innovations.co.za and click Services >> Netcourier Portal

Step 2: Enter your access code , username and password

Access Code:
This is a 3 digit code which is created when your company is set up as a client in the NetCourier backend. You would have been sent this via email when your user profile was created. If you are unsure what your company’s code is please call us on 0861 777 913.

Username:
Your username is created when someone at Freight Innovations adds you to your company profile in the NetCourier backend. You would have been sent this via email when your user profile was created. It is always an email address. If you are unsure which email address to use please contact us on 0861 777 913.

Password:
Your initial password is created when someone at Freight Innovations adds you to your company profile in the NetCourier backend. You would have been sent this via email when your user profile was created. If you are unsure of what your password is please click on Reset Password & follow the prompts.

Freight Innovations will provide you with an Access Code, Username and Password before you log in for the first time. This is usually done by email. Enter these credentials and click Sign in.

If you have forgotten your password, or don’t know if you ever received one when your user profile was created, click on Reset Password. If you have forgotten your access code or username, contact Freight Innovations for help on 0861 777 913.

Request Access

You may need your company to be added as an account holder within the Freight Innovations framework before we grant you access to the NetCourier Portal. If your company is already an account holder with us, then it is just a case of adding a new portal user. Either way, someone in the User Support team will assist you; accounts@freight-innovations.co.za

Check If I Am A User

If you are unsure as to whether you are a user on the NetCourier Portal or not, please email the User Support team; accounts@freight-innovations.co.za.

Reset Password

If you are experiencing the below error message when attempting to log in, you are either entering the incorrect Access Code, Username or Password.

In order to reset your password you must know what your Access Code and Username is. To confirm you are using the correct access code and username contact the User Support team; Accounts@freight-innovations.co.za. Once they have verified those details you are ready to go about changing your password.

To Reset your password, click on the Reset Password button and enter your access code + username.

Contact Freight Innovations on 0861 777 913 if you don’t know your access code and/ or username.

Shortly afterwards you will receive an email that looks like this:

Go back to the login page, enter your access code, username and new password.

Welcome to the Quotes guide. The best part about NetCourier quotes is that they can be converted into bookings at any time, saving you the hassle of re-entering shipment details. This is important: before you do a quote, you must pre-save the address involved. Saving your addresses up front means that you never have to manually enter the address details, avoiding human error and making future quoting far more accurate.

Do you need help with?

How to Pre-Save an Address

Once you have logged in, click on the Addresses button on the top of the screen. This will take you to the Addresses section, in the example below there are no saved addresses yet, but once we have saved a couple, they will be visible here.

Click on the Add an address button.

This will display a blank address form which you will complete.

Notice in the example below, when capturing Country and Place, just start typing and a list of options will become available for selection.

The screen will show you which fields are mandatory. Remember that an accurate address produces an accurate quote so as far as possible, save the most information.

Once you have saved an address it is available for infinite re-use in quotes and bookings. Details can be updated at any time.

When you are ready, click on the Save changes button.

After saving you will see the new address on the Addresses screen, see below. Note that you can edit or delete an address from this screen at any stage.

How to Create a Quote

Once you have logged in, click on the Quotes button on the top of the screen, then select either Imports or Exports ( The option you choose dictates the pricing and transport providers to be used in your quote. ). In the example below we have chosen Exports. This will display a blank quote form which is ready for completion.

Fields you need to complete when creating a quote:

From country: start by typing in the country code, eg: ZA = South Africa
From postcode/ address: NB! You can only capture an existing address in this field. Learn how to pre-save an address here.
To country: start by typing in the country code, eg: GB = United Kingdom
To postcode/ address: NB! You can only capture an existing address in this field. Learn how to pre-save an address here.
Contents type: either Documents or Non-Documents ( This is very important as it drives the cost calculation ).
Ready on: the date ( Be careful, it defaults to today’s date! ) the shipment will be ready for collection.
Total weight: do not complete this field, it auto-calculates based on what you enter in the Package Details section, see below.

Total number of items: do not complete this field, it auto-calculates based on what you enter in the Package Details section, see below.

Once you have completed the package details, click on the Quote button. This will display one or more services that meet your requirements. In the example below just one service from Fedex meets the requirements:

Click on the Select Service button of the service you wish to use. This will display 3 new options;

Continue as booking
Click this if you want to immediately set things in motion.
Save quote
You can save a quote for revisiting. Once saved, it is visible in the My Bookings screen.
Abandon quote
All details entered for this quote will be lost.

How to find your Pre-Saved Address

Once you have logged in, click on the Addresses button on the top of the screen. This will take you to the Addresses section, this is where all your addresses are stored. Remember, in order to do a quote or a booking, you must pre-save your addresses.

How to find Quotes you have done in the Past

All your saved quotes can be found in the My Bookings screen. See below and example of 2 saved quotes.

You can edit or delete the quote, you can also select the ‘i’ icon and convert the quote to a booking.

Best Practice Guidelines when Requesting a Quote

Email is always better than a phone call: Int@Freight-Innovations.co.za
Please create a brand-new email for each quote request instead of tagging onto an old email – this makes it easier to track in our ticketing system.
Please clearly describe the quote in the subject of your email.
For example, “Quote” as a subject is not easy to track or find later on, whereas “Saturday collection from PE to London – ABC Trading” is far more concise.

Mandatory Information to Include in your Quote Request Email:

Your Freight Innovations customer name, that is, what we know you as. For example, Joanna from ABC Trading.
Your Freight Innovations account number (if possible). This helps us to identify if any discounts apply to your account.
The name of the person or company from which the consignment is being For example, ABC Trading.
The name of the person or company to whom the consignment is being For example, Joe Soap, private residence.
Place (collection and delivery): Even if you don’t yet have full address information, please provide the nearest known suburb on both ends to ensure accuracy. If there is a rural area involved, please provide a description that we can use. The more info you include now, the less you will need to re-enter or provide to us when the quote is converted to a collection. For example, “Don’t turn off at Road A, continue straight until you see plot 5 on the left.”
Special instructions: Any and all information you can provide here will be included in the collection instruction and waybill later so once again the more detail the better. Here are some examples; is delivery on a weekend or holiday? Is the consignment fragile? Is there sufficient manpower on either end to assist with loading and off-loading heavy or large consignments? Are there specific cut off times on either end we need to know about?
Number of pieces, dimensions and weight: we need this info from the beginning to make sure your quoted price is accurate. Look at this example of how price fluctuates when you leave this information out;
“Quote” as a subject is not easy to track or find later on, whereas “Saturday collection from PE to London – ABC Trading” is far more concise.

Welcome to the Bookings guide. You can create a booking from scratch or convert a quote into a booking. You can also create a booking today but set it to activate at some point in the future.

What do you need help with?

How to Create a Booking

This section covers creation of a booking from scratch. You can also create a quote and convert that into a booking, that is covers elsewhere in our training.

Step 1: Open a new booking form

Once you have logged in, click on the Book button on the top of the screen, then select either Imports or Exports ( The option you choose dictates the service options for your shipment. ). In the example below we have chosen Exports. You will see a booking form which is ready for completion.

It is really important to understand how to populate each field in this form otherwise you might get errors when submitting the booking. Please read on for detailed descriptions of each field & how to complete them.

Step 2: Complete the booking form

This section outlines every field you see in the booking form and how you should complete it. The form itself is split into 6 main sections; Booking, Addresses, Consignment, Dimensions & Weight, Proforma Details, Services. Let’s look at each section in detail.

Booking Section:

On-screen field name	Description
Client	Mandatory. This will default to the client you are logged in under.
Booked by	Mandatory. This will default to the logged in user’s name. You are able to change this to another user within your company if you need to.
Sender Phone	Mandatory. Your office landline number
Sender Mobile	Not mandatory.
Sender Email	Mandatory. Your email address for shipment correspondence.
Booking Date	Mandatory. This is where you can select the booking for today, tomorrow or some date in the future. This controls when the Freight Innovations team receive the booking for processing.
Client Ref 1	Not Mandatory. You can choose anything to go into this field, best for it to be a standardised reference.
Client Ref 2	Not Mandatory. You can choose anything to go into this field, best for it to be a standardised reference.

Addresses Section:

On-screen field name	Description
Collection address	Mandatory. This will default to the client you are logged in under.
Sent by	Mandatory. This will default to the logged in user’s name. You are able to change this to another user within your company if you need to.
Ready on	Mandatory. Your office landline number
Ready at time	Not mandatory.
Closes date	Mandatory. Your email address for shipment correspondence.
Closes time	Mandatory. This is where you can select the booking for today, tomorrow or some date in the future. This controls when the Freight Innovations team receive the booking for processing.
Delivery address	Not Mandatory. You can choose anything to go into this field, best for it to be a standardised reference.
Sent to	Not Mandatory. You can choose anything to go into this field, best for it to be a standardised reference.
Recipient position	Not mandatory.
Recipient email	Mandatory. Your email address for shipment correspondence.
Recipient phone	Mandatory. This is where you can select the booking for today, tomorrow or some date in the future. This controls when the Freight Innovations team receive the booking for processing.
Notes	Not Mandatory. You can choose anything to go into this field, best for it to be a standardised reference.

Consignment Section:

On-screen field name	Description
Content type	Mandatory. Documents or Non-Documents. VERY IMPORTANT! If your shipment is anything more than a few pieces of paper you must choose non-document. If you choose Documents, you will be required to complete a Proforma section during the booking.
Contents	Mandatory. This is a free text field.
Consignment value	Mandatory. This is a free text field.
Insurance value	Mandatory. This is a free text field.
Payment by	Mandatory. This refers to who is responsible for the customs expense. Choose from sender, recipient or third party. Sender: choose this if you want Freight Innovations to pay the customs charge & bill the amount back to you. Recipient: choose this if you want the receiver on the other side to pay for customs before the shipment is released. Third party: choose this if you want customs to charge a separate party when the shipment reaches customs. You will be required to complete more details and the shipment will remain in custody until the third party has settled the customs bill.

Dimensions & Weight Section:

On-screen field name	Description
Total weight	Auto calculated field.
Chargeable weight	Auto calculated field.
Total number of items	The number of items that have the dimensions you are going to capture. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, you only count the 1 box. If you have 10 boxes of marbles, you count the 10 boxes.
Length	The length of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the length of the box, not the length of a marble.
Width	The width of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the width of the box, not the width of a marble.
Height	The height of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the height of the box, not the height of a marble.
Items’ total weight	The weight of each unit. EG: if you have 10 boxes of marbles each weighing 1kg, you capture 1kg and the system will calculate the total. Do not capture 10kg because that will drastically increase the total weight.

Proforma Details:

On-screen field name	Description
Description	Auto calculated field.
Commodity Code	Auto calculated field.
Country of origin	The number of items that have the dimensions you are going to capture. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, you only count the 1 box. If you have 10 boxes of marbles, you count the 10 boxes.
Unit Number	The length of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the length of the box, not the length of a marble.
Unit Value	The width of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the width of the box, not the width of a marble.
Total Value	The height of the shipment. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, give the height of the box, not the height of a marble.
Currency	The weight of each unit. EG: if you have 10 boxes of marbles each weighing 1kg, you capture 1kg and the system will calculate the total. Do not capture 10kg because that will drastically increase the total weight.
Export reason	Auto calculated field.
Manufacturer name & address	Auto calculated field.
Invoice notes	The number of items that have the dimensions you are going to capture. EG: if you have 10 marbles in 1 box, you only count the 1 box. If you have 10 boxes of marbles, you count the 10 boxes.

Service Section:

After completing all the booking fields, click on the Show Available Services button. This will display all services that meet your shipment requirements ( You don’t have to select a service at this point. You can save the booking as a quote and return to it later. ).

Step 3: Select a Service

Once you have selected a service, 3 buttons will become visible at the bottom of your screen; Book job, Save as quote, Abandon changes.

Depending on the service you pick, a new section with additional fields may appear. In the example below, FedEx has 3 new fields ready for completion;

Shipper TIN type: leave this blank

Recipient TIN type: leave this blank

Label type: always choose “PDF for Plain Paper”

To proceed with the booking click Book job.

Once a job is successfully booked, it is marked as “Awaiting collection”. Someone at Freight Innovations will receive the booking notification & set things in motion for your shipment to be collected as per your request.

How to find an Existing Booking

This section shows you how to find you bookings no matter what stage they are in. After logging on, click on the My Bookings button at the top of the screen. This will display you current bookings. Make use of the filter and search functionality if you don’t immediately see the booking you are looking for.

How to Convert a Quote into a Booking

First you need to find the quote you want to convert. Click on the My Bookings button at the top of the screen. Filter if needed to see your quotes. In the example below we see one quote. Click on the pencil icon highlighted below.

This will open up the quote and allow you complete additional fields required to create a booking.

You can re-save as a quote too, as many times as you like.

Help with Booking Errors

Every field in a booking form is important and has a bearing on whether or not a booking can be successfully submitted. Every field’s contents needs to be 100% accurate, and the deciding factor of this accuracy often lies with the service provider chosen to carry out the shipment eg: FedEx. This means that there are literally dozens of things that can cause errors when submitting a booking, and they are not always clear.

Step 1: take a screenshot of the error, like this:

Step 2: Save the booking as a quote so that you can revisit it later.

Step 3: email us

Email int@freight-innovations.co.za

Please include the following details in the email:

The quote number, so we can see it in the backend.
A screenshot of the error.

One of our team will get back to you as soon as possible.

Best Practice Guidelines when Requesting a Booking

Email is always better than a phone call: Int@Freight-Innovations.co.za
Please create a brand-new email for each booking request instead of tagging onto an old email – this makes it easier to track in our ticketing system.
Please clearly describe the booking in the subject of your email.
For example, “Export” as a subject is not easy to track or find later on, whereas “Saturday collection from PE to London – ABC Trading” is far more concise.

Mandatory Information to Include in your Booking Request Email:

Booking:

Client
Requested by
Sender Phone
Sender Mobile
Sender Email
Booking Date

Addresses:

Collection address
Sent by
Ready on
Ready at time
Closes date
Closes time
Delivery address
Sent to
Recipient email
Recipient phone

Consignment:

Content type (document/ non-document)
Contents description
Consignment value
Insurance value
Payment by (sender/ recipient/ third party)

Dimensions & Weight:

Total number of items
Length
Width
Height
Weight per item