---
title: "Read Freight Quote Requests From Email Automatically"
description: "How freight quote requests get read from email automatically: body and attachments into ports, cargo and dates, gaps flagged, rates matched, a person approves."
url: "https://pragmaticgrowth.com/guides/read-quote-requests-from-email"
language: "en"
alternate: "https://pragmaticgrowth.com/tr/guides/read-quote-requests-from-email"
---

# How Quote Requests Get Read From Email Automatically

Pricing

A system connected to your shared inbox reads each quote request, email body and Excel or PDF attachments included, into the fields a pricer needs, lists what is missing, matches the customer and the rates, and puts a prefilled request in a queue. AI does the reading; a pricer sets the price and a person approves the quote.

By [Serkan Haşlak](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/about) · Published 2026-09-24 · Updated 2026-09-24

## In Short

- Customers keep emailing the address they know. The system connects to the shared inbox, so nothing is forwarded or retyped by hand.
- AI reads the unstructured part: free-text emails, forwarded threads, and Excel or PDF attachments, into origin, destination, mode, cargo, weight, incoterm and dates.
- Missing facts are flagged, not guessed, so the pricer asks the customer once instead of finding the gap halfway through a quote.
- The request is matched to the customer and to your rate book, and lands in a queue as a prefilled quote, not a blank sheet.
- Pricing judgement and approval stay with people. Every field the system read is shown to the pricer before a quote goes out.

## What Happens When a Quote Request Arrives?

In most forwarders, a quote request today is an email that someone reads, copies into a spreadsheet, checks against a rate file and answers. Reading it automatically changes the first half of that chain and leaves the second half with your team.

The path looks the same whether the request comes from a shipper, an overseas agent or your own sales team:

1. **Request arrives**: The email lands in the shared inbox customers already use. *No new address, no form to fill.*
2. **Inbox sorted**: Quote requests are told apart from bookings, invoices and replies.
3. **Request read**: Body and attachments become structured fields in the quote form.
4. **Gaps flagged**: Anything a pricer needs but the email does not say is listed.
5. **Customer and rates matched**: The sender is linked to the customer; the lane to your contracted rates.
6. **Priced and approved**: A pricer sets the price, the right person approves, the quote goes out.

## Which Fields Does a Pricer Need From the Email?

Before anything is automated, agree the field list with your pricers. It is the same list they check in their heads today, written down once. A typical freight request needs these:

The incoterm matters more than it looks. The ICC's Incoterms 2020 rules set out 11 trade terms that allocate costs, risks and obligations between seller and buyer, and each rule lists its costs in one article (A9/B9). Under EXW the seller makes the goods available at its own premises and the buyer arranges the transport from there, so a forwarder quoting the buyer usually prices the pickup too. Under DAP the goods are delivered at the named place of destination. Reading the term correctly decides which legs you quote.

**The facts a freight quote request usually has to give**

| Field | How it appears in emails | Why the pricer needs it |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Customer | Sender, signature, company domain | Contract rates and past quotes |
| Origin | City, port, factory address, postcode | Pickup and first leg |
| Destination | Port, city or door address | Last leg and delivery |
| Mode | FCL, LCL, air, road, rail | Which rate book to use |
| Equipment and cargo | 2 x 40' HC, pallets, commodity | Space, handling, restrictions |
| Weight and volume | Tonnes per container, CBM, dimensions | Chargeable weight, overweight |
| Incoterm | EXW, FOB, DAP and others | Which legs to quote |
| Dates | Ready date, required delivery | Rate validity and sailings |
| Special handling | Hazardous class, reefer temperature, oversized | Surcharges and carrier approval |

## How the Email Body and the Attachments Get Read

Quote requests do not arrive in one format. One customer writes three lines, another forwards a long thread with the details in the fourth reply, a third attaches an Excel list of twenty shipments, and a tender arrives as a PDF. Rules and templates break on this variety, because every sender writes differently and nobody fills in your form.

This is the job AI does well: reading language rather than a fixed layout. It reads the body and the attachments, finds the origin, destination, cargo and dates wherever they are written, and puts them into the fields of the quote form. It does not decide anything about price.

The plumbing is standard. Microsoft Graph gives a system access to Microsoft 365 mailboxes, including shared mailboxes, and returns each file attachment with its name, content type and size. The Gmail API does the same for Google Workspace and lists read-only mail extraction among its uses. Your customers see no change.

At AJ Worldwide the shared inbox is connected and AI sorts every email that arrives. On a click, it reads a request, attachments included, into the quote form and lists what is missing. The pricer chooses when to read, so the queue stays under the team's control.

## What Happens When Something Is Missing?

Most requests leave something out. The rule that matters is simple: flag it, never guess it. A guessed weight or a guessed incoterm produces a quote that looks finished and is wrong, which is worse than a quote that is late.

The list of gaps is also a memory. It shows which customer always leaves out the weight and which agent never states the incoterm, so sales can raise it once and later requests arrive complete. Until the facts are in, the request waits in its own status instead of sinking in the inbox.

In practice the system lists the gaps next to the request, and the pricer asks the customer for all of them in one reply instead of discovering them one at a time. These are the gaps that come up most:

- Weight per container or per shipment
- Ready date, or only "as soon as possible"
- Incoterm, or door versus port at either end
- Exact pickup or delivery address
- Hazardous class and UN number for dangerous goods
- Dimensions for pallets, break bulk or oversized cargo

## Matching the Request to the Customer and the Rates

Once the fields are read, two lookups happen. The sender's address and company are matched to a customer record, which brings in any contract, past quotes on the same lane and who usually handles that account. Then the lane, mode and equipment are matched against the rate book: contracted ocean, trucking and rail rates first, then spot rates where no contract applies. If no valid rate exists, the system leaves the line empty and tells the pricer; it never quietly uses an expired rate.

This only works if the rates live in one place. If they sit in several spreadsheets, the system can read the request perfectly and still hand the pricer a blank rate column. That is why reading email and moving pricing off Excel are usually one project, not two.

Set up the customer record carefully once. The same company writes from different people, different domains and sometimes through an agent; if those are not tied to one customer, past quotes and contract rates stay invisible to the pricer.

The result is a prefilled request in the queue: the facts, the matched rates and the gaps. The pricer reviews a ready quote instead of starting from a blank sheet.

## What AI Does and What Stays With People

AI has one job here: reading unstructured requests. Everything that involves judgement or a commitment to a customer stays with a person.

We do not quote accuracy figures for reading, because they depend on how your customers write. What protects you is the design: every field the system read is shown to the pricer next to the request, gaps are flagged rather than filled, and no quote leaves without a person approving it.

**Who does what once requests are read automatically**

| Task | Done by | Why |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Sort the shared inbox | AI | Repetitive reading, no commitment |
| Read a request into fields | AI, checked by the pricer | Unstructured text, shown for review |
| List missing facts | The system | Follows the agreed field list |
| Look up rates | The system | One rate book, clear rules |
| Set the price and margin | The pricer | Market knowledge and customer judgement |
| Approve the quote | The agreed approver | Commitment to the customer |
| Negotiate and follow up | The pricer or sales | A relationship, not a lookup |

## How to Start Without Changing How Customers Write

Start from real mail, not a demo. Collect a few weeks of real requests, including the messy ones, and agree the field list with the pricers who answer them. Then connect the shared inbox and run the reading on live requests while the team keeps quoting the old way for a short, fixed period. What the pricers correct tells you what to fix before you switch.

During the parallel run, watch three things: the fields pricers correct most often, emails that were sorted wrongly or not read, and requests waiting on missing facts. The first improves the field list, the second the sorting, the third the questions you send customers.

Do not ask customers to use a template or a portal. The point is that they keep emailing the way they do today and the work behind the address changes.

At AJ Worldwide this was one part of a larger move: the pricing team went from three spreadsheets and a shared inbox to one system in under five months. Today 14 pricers work every request there, and every quote gets a follow-up date.

## Questions

### Does the system send quotes on its own?

No. It reads the request, matches rates and prepares the quote. A pricer sets the price and the agreed person approves it before it goes to the customer.

### How accurate is the reading?

It depends on how your customers write, so we do not publish a figure. Every field is shown to the pricer before a quote goes out, and anything the email does not say is flagged rather than guessed.

### Do customers need to use a form or a template?

No. They keep emailing the address they already use, in their own words, with their own attachments.

### What about requests that come by WhatsApp or phone?

Paste or forward them into the same queue so every request has an owner and a follow-up date, wherever it started.

### Which email systems does this work with?

Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace both offer APIs for reading mailboxes; Microsoft Graph also covers shared mailboxes. We connect to the inbox you already use.

## Sources

- [ICC: Incoterms® 2020](https://iccwbo.org/business-solutions/incoterms-rules/incoterms-2020/)
- [ICC Academy: FCA and EXW Incoterms® 2020 explained](https://academy.iccwbo.org/incoterms/article/incoterms-2020-exw-or-fca/)
- [Microsoft Learn: Outlook mail API overview (Microsoft Graph)](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/graph/outlook-mail-concept-overview)
- [Microsoft Learn: fileAttachment resource type (Microsoft Graph)](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/graph/api/resources/fileattachment?view=graph-rest-1.0)
- [Google for Developers: Gmail API overview](https://developers.google.com/workspace/gmail/api/guides)

## The Case Behind This Guide

### How AJ Worldwide Moved Pricing Off Excel

AJ Worldwide · International freight forwarding

AJ Worldwide's pricing team ran on three spreadsheets and a shared inbox. Since May 2026 it has worked in one pricing system, and the system keeps changing with the business.

- **14 pricers** work every request in one system, instead of three spreadsheets and a shared inbox
- **Under 5 months** from the first build to the team quoting in the system

[Read the story](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/work/ajww-pricing)

## The System We Build

[Pricing & Quoting](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/services/pricing): One system for rates, quotes and approvals.

[Explore the service](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/services/pricing)

## Related Guides

- [How to Move Freight Pricing Off Excel](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/guides/freight-pricing-off-excel): Moving freight pricing off Excel means putting your contracted and spot rates, incoming quote requests, approvals, sent quotes and follow-ups into one system the whole pricing team works in. Do it in order: map how a quote flows today with your pricers, agree the process, bring the rates in, run old and new side by side, then switch.
- [Freight Quoting Software or a System Built for You?](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/guides/freight-quoting-software-vs-custom-system): Buy off-the-shelf quoting software if your quote flow is close to the industry standard and you need it running within weeks; have a system built around your process if the way you price is part of how you win and every product needs workarounds. The two can also work together: a rate platform can feed a system built around your own workflow.

[All guides](https://pragmaticgrowth.com/guides)

## Show Us How Your Team Works Today

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[Book a Call](https://cal.com/serkanhaslak/pragmatic-growth)