Cloud-native transportation management for planning, executing, and settling freight across shipper and 3PL operations.
About Manhattan TMS
Manhattan ActiveTransportation is a cloud-native transportation management system for shippers and logistics providers. It supports freight planning, carrier and rate selection, tendering, tracking, and settlement on Manhattan ActivePlatform. Available capabilities vary by edition: parcel is listed in Enterprise, while ocean, air, rail, dynamic shipment planning, crossdock/relay, 3PL buy-sell, and Load Builder are listed in Enterprise Premier. Dispatch Management, Yard Management, and ActiveAgents are add-ons. Confirm edition, mode coverage, integration scope, and commercial terms with Manhattan.
Listed capabilities
Continuous transportation planning (capabilities vary by edition)
Route planning and carrier/rate selection
Shipment and load planning (Load Builder: Enterprise Premier)
Carrier tendering and in-transit tracking (coverage depends on connections)
Carrier and vendor network connectivity
Transportation procurement and scenario analysis (confirm edition/scope)
Transportation Management Systems capabilities to compare with your workflows.
Planning and multimodal execution
How Manhattan plans, assigns, dispatches, and executes transportation.
Carrier and rate selection for shipment execution
(native):
Manhattan describes ActiveTransportation as selecting the carrier, equipment, and rate option for each shipment scenario and connecting freight execution to order fulfillment.
Condition: The public page does not enumerate every mode, optimization objective, constraint, or planning limit.
Detailed load and route optimization
(not verified):
The reviewed public sources do not provide enough detail to verify solver constraints, consolidation, multi-stop optimization, or objective weighting; this is not a conclusion that Manhattan lacks those functions.
Questions to test in a demo
Plan and execute a shipment with equipment, service, cost, capacity, and appointment constraints and show the decision trail.
Demonstrate multi-stop consolidation and re-planning after a missed appointment or capacity change.
Carrier, rate, and tender management
How Manhattan compares transportation options and moves plans into carrier execution.
Carrier and rate selection
(native):
Manhattan explicitly documents carrier and rate selection for each shipment scenario in ActiveTransportation.
Condition: The public material does not detail contract lifecycle, accessorial logic, tender acceptance windows, or fallback rules.
Tender fallback and bid management
(not verified):
The reviewed sources do not provide enough detail to verify bid rounds, award splitting, rejection timeout, routing-guide fallback, or automated re-tender; this is not a conclusion that Manhattan lacks those functions.
Questions to test in a demo
Run a carrier and rate decision with contract, spot, fuel, accessorial, eligibility, and expiry inputs.
Reject and time out a tender and show fallback, re-tender, approval, and complete event history.
Shipment visibility and exception handling
How Manhattan provides execution visibility and manages transportation exceptions.
Freight execution visibility
(native):
Manhattan describes a unified freight execution platform that connects transportation activity to the order and fulfillment process.
Condition: Event coverage, ETA calculation, telematics participation, latency, and proof-of-delivery detail are not fully specified publicly.
Exception queues and escalation
(not verified):
The reviewed sources do not provide enough detail to verify configurable alert thresholds, exception ownership, escalation, or automated remediation; this is not a conclusion that Manhattan lacks those functions.
Questions to test in a demo
Trace a shipment from order through delivery and show source events, timestamps, ETA, and missing-signal behavior.
Create a late or disrupted shipment and demonstrate prioritization, alert routing, ownership, escalation, and resolution audit.
Freight audit and order-to-cash
How transportation charges are checked, approved, and connected to payment.
Freight settlement and invoice audit
(native):
Manhattan documents freight settlement and audit for contract-rate and service-term compliance, invoice matching, payment processing, and issue resolution.
Condition: The public article does not specify matching dimensions, tolerances, dispute controls, payment rails, tax, or regional scope.
Complete customer order-to-cash
(not verified):
The reviewed sources verify carrier freight settlement and audit, not customer billing, receivables, collections, and cash application end to end; this is not a conclusion that Manhattan lacks those functions.
Questions to test in a demo
Match a carrier invoice to contract, shipment, service, and accessorial facts and show audit, approval, dispute, payment, and accounting handoff.
Identify which customer billing, receivables, collections, and cash-application steps are native, integrated, or outside the TMS.
Configuration and connectivity
How Manhattan connects transportation services and manages its extensible platform.
REST API connectivity
(native):
Manhattan documents an Active API that follows REST conventions and uses JSON requests and responses for platform integration.
Condition: The public developer documentation does not establish complete transportation endpoint coverage, quotas, commercial scope, or implementation effort.
Self-service transportation rule governance
(not verified):
The reviewed sources do not provide enough detail to verify no-code administration of rates, carrier eligibility, alerts, environments, testing, versioning, or rollback; this is not a conclusion that Manhattan lacks those functions.
Questions to test in a demo
Integrate an order source, carrier, and accounting system through the API and show authentication, mappings, retries, monitoring, and replay.
Change a carrier, tender, rate, or exception rule and demonstrate permissions, testing, version history, audit, and rollback.
Before you choose: Confirm which capabilities apply to your plan and setup, and ask about any listed conditions.