What is a shipping manifest?

What is a shipping manifest? 

A shipping manifest, or delivery manifest, is a document a business creates via their sending portal to summarise shipping details, including the number, size and weights of items being lodged for delivery. This gives the carrier a clear idea of what they’re collecting and is the starting point for calculating shipping charges.

How do carriers like Australia Post use shipping manifests?

Carriers use manifests to make sure they know exactly what they’re collecting, and where it needs to go. They may also use them to help with:

• Route planning 
• Loading/unloading of trucks 
• Ensuring we don’t exceed the weight limits of our vehicles 
• Validating addresses that may be unreadable on the shipping label 
• Calculating shipping charges  

Manifest documents are also used to calculate shipping costs, based on the volume, weight and destinations of items being shipped.

How do I create a shipping manifest?

Australia Post has a number of different systems for generating shipping manifests. If you use Parcel Send for shipping, you can generate manifests in just a few clicks:

1. Select your shipment from the Ready to despatch tab and click Despatch. This opens the Despatch summary page.
2. Check that all your information is correct, then click Manifest & print to generate your manifest summary. Note: You can reprint a manifest at any point.

Don’t forget, it’s a good idea to keep a copy of all your manifests on file for your own records and for compliance purposes.

How is a shipping manifest helpful?

A shipping manifest is useful to both you and your carrier. It helps you keep track of items being shipped and provides a secure record of what’s being sent where. This can be helpful if customer disputes arise. It can also help you with inventory management.