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Know Where Every Shipment Is — Without Picking Up the Phone
In-Transit Visibility API Standard
Once a shipment leaves the dock, shippers, third-party logistics providers (3PLs), and receivers are often left waiting for a phone call to find out where it is. The In-Transit Visibility API Standard gives the less-than-truckload (LTL) industry a common way to communicate shipment status, delays, and delivery estimates—from the moment a carrier takes possession of a shipment to the moment the receiver signs for it.
Why the LTL Industry Needs a Standard for In-Transit Visibility
Continuous Visibility from Pickup to Delivery
One Standard, Two Ways to See a Shipment
In-Transit Visibility is the only LTL API standard built with both Verified and Public access in mind. Account holders can receive full shipment detail, while non-account parties—including misbilled, collect, or third-party-billed shipments—can still retrieve public status information instead of hitting a dead end.
A Shared Framework for Delays and Exceptions
What Is the In-Transit Visibility API Standard?
It standardizes the shipment milestones, terminal activity, delivery estimates, and exception and reason codes that carriers, shippers, 3PLs, and technology providers exchange throughout the shipment lifecycle.
The standard covers the period between pickup and delivery: it begins when a carrier acknowledges physical possession of a shipment and ends when the carrier delivers it and the receiver acknowledges receipt.
Rather than each carrier building its own proprietary status language, the standard gives the industry a common structure—delivered via push notification where possible, and available on request
—so that stakeholders across the LTL ecosystem can work from the same shipment data.
Across the Supply Chain
Benefits for Carriers
Automatic, event-triggered notifications update subscribed stakeholders as a shipment's status changes, reducing the volume of calls into carrier call centers.
A shared set of milestone statuses—Picked up, In Transit, Interline, Out for Delivery, Delivered—means customers get the same status vocabulary on every shipment, regardless of complexity.
Normalized reason codes let carriers communicate the cause of a delay or missed delivery in an industry-recognized format, while still mapping to their own internal code structure.
Standardizing handling of interline handoffs—including partner carrier name and Standard Carrier Alpha Code® (SCAC)® where available—reduces the confusion interline shipments often create for customers.
The standard defines the data elements and structure, but carriers decide what to expose based on the data their own systems can support today.
Benefits for Shippers
Track a shipment's progress through standardized milestones instead of waiting on carrier callbacks to know where it stands.
Updated delivery estimates, days-in-transit, and a countdown of stops remaining as a shipment nears its final destination support better downstream planning.
Proactive notifications flag events like anticipated late delivery, damage, shortages, or added accessorials as they're recorded — not after the fact.
Standardized reason codes identify the general cause of a missed delivery and the responsible party, giving shippers a consistent explanation across every carrier they work with.
Self-serve access to shipment data reduces the need to call a carrier just to confirm where a shipment is.
Benefits for 3PLs and Technology Providers
For 3PLs
- One Set of Statuses Across Every Carrier: Instead of reconciling different status definitions from each LTL carrier in a network, 3PLs work from the same milestone and exception structure across all of them, simplifying how status gets relayed to customers.
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Coverage Even on Shipments Outside Your Account: The standard's Public access option means a 3PL can still retrieve status on shipments not directly tied to its account — such as misbilled, miskeyed, or third-party-billed freight — rather than hitting an access error.
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Fewer Manual Touchpoints: Consistent, push-based updates reduce the manual tracking work required to keep customers current across multiple carrier relationships.
For Technology and TMS Providers
- A Common Data Model to Build Against: Standardized fields, milestone statuses, and notification types give development teams a consistent structure to design around, rather than mapping a new schema for every carrier integration.
- Two Access Levels Designed In: Verified and Public data structures are both part of the standard, giving platforms a clear framework for handling authenticated account holders and non-account inquiries alike.
- Easier Multi-Carrier Interoperability: A shared standard for shipment events and exceptions reduces the custom logic needed to bring consistent LTL visibility into a single platform.
How In-Transit Visibility Works
1.
Carrier Takes Possession
In-transit visibility begins the moment a carrier acknowledges physical custody of a shipment, with the necessary documentation executed (signed BOL, eBOL, or trailer swap).
2.
Standardized Status Events Are Recorded
As the shipment moves—picked up, arriving at and departing terminals, in transit, handed to an interline partner if needed, and out for delivery — the carrier records the corresponding milestone.
3.
Updates Are Pushed to Subscribed Stakeholders
Delivery-update notifications (physical movement) and delivery-information notifications (appointments, accessorials, customs updates, reason codes) are sent automatically to authorized parties as events occur. Stakeholders can also pull the latest status directly by Pro number, BOL number, PO number, or account number.
4.
Exceptions Are Flagged With Standardized Codes
If a delay, damage, shortage, or missed delivery occurs, the carrier records it using a normalized reason code, so stakeholders understand what happened and who's responsible without needing to call.
5.
Delivery Is Confirmed
In-transit visibility ends when the carrier delivers the shipment to the receiver, the receiver acknowledges receipt, and stakeholders are notified that proof of delivery is available.
Shipment Statuses, Notifications, and Exceptions the Standard Covers
The standard defines a common vocabulary for what's happening to a shipment, so stakeholders don't have to interpret carrier-specific language.
Examples include:
Shipment Milestone Statuses
Notification Types
Delivery Update notifications cover physical movement—milestone changes, terminal activity, and countdown-to-delivery stop counts.
Delivery Information notifications cover related but non-movement event —appointment and accessorial changes, customs updates, and assigned reason codes.
Common Exception Notifications
Noted Late · Noted Damage · Noted Short or Lost · Noted Reweigh · Noted Accessorial Added · Reconsignment Notification · Appointment Scheduled, Missed, or Rescheduled · Missed Delivery · Customs Information Updated
Additional Shipment Detail
Updated ETA and estimated days in transit, stop counts remaining before final delivery, proof-of-delivery availability, and cross-border status (In Bond, Hold, Cleared Customs) where applicable.
This is a representative view, not the full specification. The complete field definitions, schemas, and accepted values are documented in the API Standard and its associated YAML file.
Built by the Industry, for the Industry...
The In-Transit Visibility API Standard was developed through the National Motor Freight Traffic Association, Inc.® (NMFTA)®'s Digital Standards Development Council (DSDC) and its Digital LTL Council, bringing carriers, shippers, 3PLs, and technology providers together to define a common framework for communicating shipment status across the LTL ecosystem.
This is an industry standard, not a software product. DSDC does not sell or host an in-transit visibility platform — the standard provides the shared structure, and implementers retain discretion over endpoint design and how much data their systems can support. The goal is interoperability: a shipment's status should mean the same thing no matter which carrier, shipper, 3PL, or platform is looking at it.
Give Your Shipments a Common Language
In-transit visibility only works at industry scale is carriers, shippers, 3PLs, and technology providers are speaking the same terms. Download the In-Transit Visibility API Standard to see how your organization can adopt a consistent framework for shipment status, exceptions, and delivery updates.
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