Documents scattered across inboxes
The current bill of lading is an attachment in a thread, and the only person who can find it is on leave.
Import & Export
The consignment, its paperwork and its true cost, together.
Cross-border trade goes wrong on paper, not at sea. OrbitWix keeps the trade order, its documentation, its compliance milestones and its landed cost on one record — so a consignment can be priced and sold while it is still moving.
Common business problems
Where a shipment stops being knowable.
The goods usually arrive. What goes missing on the way is the record of what was agreed, what it cost and where the paperwork got to.
Landed cost arrives after the sale
Freight, duty, insurance and handling are totalled once the invoices come in — by which time the goods are priced and gone.
Compliance discovered late
A missing certificate becomes visible at the port rather than at the point the order was raised.
Currency handled by hand
The order is in one currency and the books in another, and the rate applied is whichever one was to hand that day.
Nobody can say where it is
Status is knowledge held by one person and refreshed by phone, not a state anyone else can read.
The sale is priced on a guess
Goods still at sea are quoted against an assumed cost, and the margin is discovered afterwards.
The solution
What the solution puts in place.
Six parts, all hanging off the trade order — which is the record the whole consignment is organised around.
Trade orders and terms
Import and export orders carrying incoterms, payment terms and supplier confirmation on the record itself.
Documentation
Invoice, packing list, bill of lading, certificates and customs paperwork attached to the order, each with its own status.
Compliance and milestones
The checks a consignment has to pass and the dates it has to pass them by, visible before the container is.
Shipment and logistics
Carriers, trips and freight cost captured against the consignment they moved rather than a general expense line.
Landed cost and currency
Freight, duty, insurance and handling allocated across the items, in the order’s own currency and in your base one.
Selling from incoming stock
Quotations and orders raised against a consignment that has not landed yet, priced on cost that is already known.
Example business flow
One consignment, eight stages.
The sequence from doc — customer order through to settlement — with the same record carried the whole way.
A consignment moves through eight stages: customer order, trade order, documentation, compliance, shipment, logistics, delivery and finance.
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01 Customer order
EX-2026-0114
Received
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02 Trade order
EX-2026-0114
Raised
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03 Documentation
EX-2026-0114
Issued
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04 Compliance
EX-2026-0114
Cleared
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05 Shipment
EX-2026-0114
In transit
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06 Logistics
EX-2026-0114
Assigned
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07 Delivery
EX-2026-0114
Delivered
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08 Finance
EX-2026-0114
Settled
Benefits
What changes on the next consignment.
Cost known while it moves
Freight and duty land on the consignment as they are incurred, so the selling price is set against real cost.
Paperwork with a status
A document is either issued or it is not, and that is on the record rather than in a mail thread.
Compliance seen early
A missing certificate is visible when the order is raised, not when the container is standing at the port.
One currency story
The order keeps its own currency and rate; reporting rolls up to your base currency without a spreadsheet.
Stock that knows it is coming
Incoming consignments are visible to sales, so goods can be committed before they land.
Import and export on one shape
The same trade order runs in either direction; only the documents and milestones differ.
Apps used
The apps behind it.
Import and export is not a separate product. It is these apps, on the shared Core OS, arranged around one way of working.
Trade
Import and export orders with their documentation and landed cost.
Logistics
Trips, carriers and freight cost allocated to what moved.
Inventory
Real-time stock across warehouses, batches and serial numbers.
Sales
Quotations, price lists and the order everything downstream reads.
FAQ
Questions about import and export.
Does it replace our freight forwarder or CHA?
No. It is the record of what they are doing for you — the consignment, its documents, its milestones and its cost — so their updates land somewhere your own team can read rather than in a mailbox.
Can we sell goods that have not arrived?
Yes. An incoming consignment is visible to sales with its expected arrival, so an order can be committed against it and the customer given a date that means something.
How is duty handled across many items?
Duty, freight, insurance and handling are captured against the consignment and allocated across its items, so the landed cost of a single unit reflects its share rather than an average applied afterwards.
Does it work for re-export?
Yes. Goods coming in and going out again run on the same trade order structure, and the costs of both legs land on the same consignment.
Have a different question? Talk to us.
Take a consignment that cost more than it should have.
We will walk through where the cost would have become visible, and how early.