Deploy a Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent and Tier on Facts
The AgentWorks Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent takes carrier scorecards off your carrier manager. It tracks every carrier's on-time delivery, damage, claim responsiveness and communication as loads move, builds scorecards automatically, shares them with carriers, and recommends tier changes based on what actually happened. Your carrier manager and dispatchers spend their time with shippers and good carriers, not assembling spreadsheets once a quarter.
What it takes off your plate
Ask a dispatcher at any brokerage or shipper which carriers are reliable and you will get a confident answer based on the last few loads they remember. Ask for the data and you will get a shrug. Scorecards get built once a quarter when someone pulls tracking data, claims and emails into a spreadsheet, and by then the quarter is over.
Meanwhile a carrier whose on-time performance has been sliding for weeks keeps getting loads because nobody has seen the trend. The preferred carrier program exists on paper, but tiers reflect relationships more than results. The shipper whose freight was late twice this month is asking what you are doing about it, and the honest answer is not much.
What the Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent does, step by step
It starts with the communication that makes a scorecard useful.
- Shares scorecards with carriers. On the cadence you set, the Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent sends each carrier's contact their own scorecard with the loads behind each metric.
- Asks about misses. When a carrier's performance slips, it emails the carrier's operations contact to ask for the cause and a corrective plan, and logs the reply.
- Tracks responsiveness. It records how quickly carriers answer check calls, tracking requests and claim correspondence, because communication is part of the score.
- Briefs your team. It sends your carrier manager a short summary of carriers trending up or down and the tier changes it recommends.
Then the data work:
- Captures performance per load. It records pickup and delivery against appointment times, damage and shortage reports, and exceptions for every load and carrier.
- Pulls claim data. It reads claim filings and responses so claim responsiveness is measured from the record, not memory.
- Builds scorecards. Each carrier gets a scorecard across on-time delivery, damage rate, claim responsiveness and communication, by lane where it matters.
- Recommends tiers. It suggests which carriers should move up to preferred, which should be watched, and which should get fewer loads, for your carrier manager to approve.
The claim side of the score comes from the work described in filing freight claims on time, and the exception side from tracking root causes by carrier and lane.
Where the work is recorded
Every scorecard the Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent sends, every question to a carrier and every reply is logged on the carrier's account in your CRM. Anyone calling a carrier can see the latest score, the open issues and what the carrier committed to fix.
The performance data lives with the loads in your TMS, so each metric traces back to the loads behind it. When the carrier manager opens the dashboard the next morning, they see current scores, carriers flagged overnight, and tier recommendations waiting for approval. Dispatchers see each carrier's tier when they tender a load.
What your people do instead
Your carrier manager builds partnerships with the carriers who perform, and has fact-based conversations with the ones who do not. Dispatchers tender to the best carrier for the lane with confidence. Your account managers can tell shippers exactly how their freight is being protected.
Shippers want a provider who holds carriers accountable, and now you can show them. At a quarterly business review, your account manager can walk a shipper through how their lanes performed, which carriers moved up, and what was done about the ones that slipped. Good carriers benefit too: they see their score, know what earns more freight, and get recognized for it. The Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent keeps the data and the follow-up moving; your people keep the relationships strong on both sides.
One next step
If carrier tiers in your operation still come from memory, take the free Logistics Industry Assessment. It shows which workflow an agent should take first. You can see every logistics agent AgentWorks runs on the Logistics industry page.
See where the Carrier Performance Scorecard Agent would start in your logistics business.
I'm Rusty, the Logistics ambassador here. The free Industry Assessment reads your website and asks how calls, follow-ups and records happen today, then shows the first workflow worth handing to an agent like this one — and what your team gets back. Leave your email and I'll send the link.
Rusty replies from logistics@agentworksstudio.com. One email with the link — no list, no drip, unless you ask for the weekly letter. Or go straight there →