Cargo claim files assembled, with every deadline on the front page.

A shipper or consignee writes in: two pallets short, a crushed case, a reefer load that arrived warm. Your claims handler finds the load, pulls the BOL and POD, gathers the photos, asks for the invoice, looks up the carrier's cargo insurance, works out the dates, and sends the claim to the carrier. Then the waiting starts.

For the test, AI assembles that file from copies of claims your team already closed. Each draft holds the documents in order, the amount and what supports it, and a dated list of deadlines, plus what is missing. It sends nothing to a carrier or insurer and says nothing about fault. Your reviewer compares each file with how the claim actually went.

A notation is not a claim. The federal claim rules for motor carriers and freight forwarders, 49 CFR Part 370, say a claim has to be in writing, identify the shipment, assert the carrier's liability, and ask for a specified or determinable amount of money. Bad order reports, inspection reports and shortage or damage notations don't count as a claim on their own. So the exception the consignee wrote at delivery starts the file but files nothing. The draft checks the claim letter against those elements before your handler sends it.

The dates. Under the Carmack Amendment, 49 U.S.C. 14706, a carrier can't allow less than nine months to file a claim, or less than two years to sue after it disallows a claim in writing; the bill of lading or your contract sets the actual period. Part 370 then gives the carrier 30 days to acknowledge a claim in writing and 120 days to pay, decline or make a firm offer, with a written status update every 60 days after that. The draft works out each date from your terms and the dates in the file, and puts them at the top.

What supports the amount. Part 370 lists what a carrier can ask for: the bill of lading, evidence of the freight charges, and the invoice for the goods, certified as true and correct, or a certified statement of their value. When a whole shipment goes missing, the carrier can ask the consignee to certify in writing that it wasn't received from another source. Carmack also lets a carrier limit its liability to a value the shipper declared or agreed to in writing, so a released value on the BOL changes what the claim can recover. The draft shows the amount, the document behind it, and any released value it found.

Counts, seals and concealed damage. A BOL marked shipper load and count means the driver didn't watch the loading, so a shortage on a trailer that arrived with its seal intact is argued differently from one counted at the dock. Damage found after a clean signature, concealed damage, usually turns on how soon it was reported and whether the carrier got to inspect. Freight that was refused or couldn't be delivered becomes salvage, and Part 370 has the carrier record the salvage lot and any money recovered against the claim. The draft notes each of these and the document that shows it.

The carrier's insurance, and what your reviewer watches. The file pulls the certificate of insurance you held for that carrier, with its insurer, policy number, cargo limit and dates, and checks that coverage ran through the ship date. A certificate only summarizes; the policy decides, and cargo policies commonly exclude things like reefer breakdown or theft from an unattended truck unless they were added. Your reviewer, the person who knows your claims work best, usually the claims or OS&D lead, checks the dates first, then the amount, then every gap the draft listed. The file never states who is liable.

Once your reviewer says yes, claim files are built for new claims for about 30 days.

Each file waits for your claims handler to review it before anything goes to a carrier, an insurer or a customer, and its dates are recalculated when a carrier answers. Whether to accept an offer, push back or settle stays with your team.

That is the whole live run. Any other job is priced on its own.