Getting the best route is not the same as getting the best overall shipping cost. It is often less costly to use a combination of different shipping means to get the best overall shipping cost for shipping commodities from the sender address to the recipient address. However, it requires more logistics coordination and experience. The use of a single transport carrier may provide the best routing to provide shipping from the address to the pick-up point. It requires less logistics coordination and paperwork. While shipping using various modes of transport, you may have come across the terms intermodal and multimodal. Sometimes these terms are used incorrectly interchangeably.

When using a carrier for your shipment, understanding the difference and accurately communicating your requests to the carrier can help avoid any misunderstandings. Let us now take a look at the difference between intermodal shipping and multimodal shipping.

Intermodal Shipping


Simply put, intermodal shipping is when your shipments are handled by several different shipping companies.

Intermodal is defined as the transportation of the cargo from the departure address to the destination address, with various modes of transportation and companies, with the agreement of the owner company independently with each transport company. More than one carrier during a single shipment, each leg of the shipment is handled by a separate carrier. The shipper has to enter into several contracts, one with each shipping company, to handle the particular leg of the shipment.

Getting the best route is not the same as getting the best overall shipping cost.

For door-to-door shipping, it is sometimes more advantageous to use a combination of different carriers to get the best overall shipping cost. However, it requires more logistics knowledge and experience. Using a single transport company to provide address-to-address transport may provide the best solution. Less time wasted and employee savings.

Let's say you need to transport a large amount of cargo to another country. Both of these countries are landlocked and on different continents. This may mean contacting a road freight company to move your shipment to a rail yard to move the load. When you arrive at the railway area, you will transport your cargo to a port. Cargo will be loaded on a ship and transported to another overseas port, where it will be unloaded and transported by another rail carrier. Finally, the shipment will be transported by road freight back to the destination location from the rail area.

When using intermodal shipping, each leg of that shipment will be handled by a separate company. This means you will have to contract with each carrier separately to handle the specific leg of the shipment.

Some advantages of doing this, of course, some advantages are provided by the shipping company. But you have to discuss the shipping terms with each company separately. This also means more overhead for you as you will have to follow multiple contracts with different carriers.

You may also be responsible for coordinating delays, as one company may not be aware of delays that another company may experience.

The advantages of intermodal transport are associated with:

a) Intermodal transport company can choose carriers to benefit from more advantageous prices for each transport leg;

b) Flexibility and expertise in loading and unloading goods at different ports;

c) reducing carbon footprints by choosing environmentally friendly carriers;

d) enhancing the safety of transported products; and

e) The intermodal carrier has greater access to the right equipment and can better control the capacity and choice of transit schedules.

 

Multimodal Shipping


Multimodal is defined as the transportation of the cargo from the point of origin to the destination by various modes of transport, each of which is responsible for a different transport company, but under a single contract or bill of lading. Single carrier during a single trip. The only shipping company is responsible for transporting the shipment at all stages of transportation, with all modes of transportation.

In simple terms, Multimodal uses various modes of transport but there is a transport bill of lading.

The difference between multimodal and intermodal lies in the contract/bill of lading and carrier/carrier's responsibility.

Going back to our example above, polymorphic shipping would be where a company or a contract would undertake all the steps of the journey. This means that the same company will be responsible for moving your shipment through all steps of all modes of transport.