Portal messaging
Thread-per-shipment messaging that replaces scattered emails.
1 min readLast updated 13 Apr 2026
Portal messaging turns email chaos into a structured thread-per-record log, visible to everyone who needs it on both sides.
Where threads attach
- Shipments — ops questions, ETA requests, changes.
- Invoices — disputes, payment queries, partial allocations.
- Quotes — clarifications, changes.
- Accounts — general / non-record questions.
Participants
- Your team — ops / sales / finance users with the relevant role.
- Customer contacts — the account's portal-active contacts.
- Auto-added — the shipment owner, the AE, the collector (per thread type).
What's in a thread
- Messages (rich text, attachments).
- System events (shipment moved to customs hold) — optional inline, keeps context.
- @mentions — notify a specific person by name.
- Status: open / waiting-customer / resolved.
Notifications
- Email on new messages (threaded, reply-to works).
- In-app bell.
- Mobile notification if using mobile-web.
Email-in
Customer replies to a notification email go back into the thread. Means customers don't need to change their habit — they still get emails — but everything is captured in one place.
SLA
- Response SLA per tenant (e.g. respond within 4 business hours).
- Breach alerts to ops manager.
- Customer-visible SLA badge builds trust.
Why not just email
- Multiple ops staff see the same thread — no context loss on handover.
- Customer's team all see status (buyer, scheduler, billing) without forwarding.
- Searchable across years.
- Linked tightly to the record in context.
Privacy
Threads attach to records the participant has access to. A customer contact can't see a thread on a shipment they're not a party to.
Archive
Resolved threads archive after N days (configurable) — stay searchable, stop generating notifications.
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