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Glossary

Common logistics terms

A

Accessorial
An extra service a freight carrier charges for on top of moving the freight — a liftgate, an inside delivery, a residential address, a delivery appointment. Each one you ask for adds to the cost, so only select the ones you actually need. See Freight forwarding.
ASN (Advance Shipment Notice)
Industry term for an electronic notification sent by a supplier ahead of a shipment. Listed here because you will hear it on the dock — the Zora platform does not consume ASN feeds. Receiving orders are created manually or by bulk upload.

B

Barcode
A pattern of lines or a printed code that a scanner reads to identify a product or a location.
BOL (Bill of Lading)
The document that travels with a freight shipment. It acts as the carrier's receipt for the goods, the contract to carry them, and the record of who owns them in transit. The driver signs it at pickup and you keep a copy. See Freight forwarding.

C

Cross-Dock
Moving goods from an inbound shipment straight to an outbound one without putting them into storage first.
Cycle Count
Counting a portion of your inventory on a regular rotating schedule, instead of counting everything at once. See Cycle Counting.

E

ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning)
Software a company uses to run its core operations — finance, purchasing, inventory — in one connected system.

F

FEFO (First Expired, First Out)
Allocation strategy that picks the earliest-expiring stock first. Used where shelf life matters more than age — food, pharmaceuticals, chemicals. One of the three strategies a warehouse can be set to, alongside FIFO and LIFO.
FIFO (First In, First Out)
Allocation strategy that picks the oldest stock first. The default for a new warehouse.
Freight Class
A number from 50 to 500 that decides what an LTL shipment costs. It is worked out from the freight's density, how easily it stacks, how hard it is to handle, and how likely it is to be damaged or stolen. Dense, sturdy freight gets a low number and a lower rate. Declaring the wrong class gets the shipment reclassified and re-priced by the carrier.

I

Inventory
The goods and materials a business has on hand.

L

LIFO (Last In, First Out)
Allocation strategy that picks the newest stock first.
Location
Physical storage position within a warehouse (e.g., aisle, bay, shelf).
LPN (License Plate Number)
Unique identifier assigned to a pallet or container of goods for tracking purposes. Also known as a "license plate" or "pallet ID". See LPN Container Management.
LTL (Less Than Truckload)
Freight that does not fill a trailer on its own, so it shares the trailer with other shippers' freight. Cheaper than booking a whole truck, but slower, because the trailer stops to pick up and drop off along the way.

M

MBL (Master Bill of Lading)
The bill of lading covering a whole consolidated container, which may hold freight for several customers. Zora can break container costs down by MBL. See Reports.

N

NMFC (National Motor Freight Classification)
The published standard that assigns a freight class to a commodity. When you are not sure which class your freight is, this is what the carrier checks.

O

Order Fulfillment
Everything that happens between an order coming in and it reaching the customer — receiving it, processing it, and shipping it out.

P

Picking
Pulling products from their warehouse locations to fill an order.
PO (Purchase Order)
A document a buyer sends a seller listing the products, quantities, and prices being ordered.
POD (Proof of Delivery)
Confirmation that a shipment reached its destination — usually a signature, a timestamp, and sometimes a photo. What you produce when a customer says they never received it.
Putaway
Moving received inventory from the receiving dock to its storage location.

R

Receiving
Checking in and recording inventory shipments as they arrive.

S

SCAC (Standard Carrier Alpha Code)
A 2-4 letter code identifying a freight carrier, used on bills of lading and in EDI messages. You record it against each freight carrier. See Carriers.
Serial Number
A unique number assigned to one individual item so you can track it on its own — common for electronics and other high-value goods.
SKU (Stock Keeping Unit)
A unique code identifying one distinct product or service you sell or track.

T

3PL (Third-Party Logistics)
A company you hire to handle warehousing, shipping, or other logistics work instead of doing it yourself.
Transload
Transferring freight from one transport vehicle to another, typically with brief staging rather than long-term storage.

U

UN Number
Four-digit United Nations identifier for a hazardous substance or article, written with a UN prefix (for example, UN3480 for lithium-ion batteries). Recorded on hazmat products and on document receipt parcels, and used by compliance rules. See Hazmat Management.

W

Audit Log
The record of who changed what and when. Surfaced in the interface as Activity History. See Activity History.
Barcode Lookup
Scanning a barcode without knowing what it is first. The system works out whether it's a product, an LPN, or a location, and shows you accordingly.
Data Filter
Row-level access control that limits a user to particular customers or warehouses. A user with a customer data filter sees only that customer's inventory, orders, and receiving — the restriction applies everywhere, not just on one page. Users can hold several filters at once. See Roles & Permissions.
Delivery Request
A request to have goods delivered, raised either by warehouse staff or by a customer through the customer portal. See Delivery Requests.
Doc Receipt
A freight forwarding record covering documentation for received parcels, including hazmat details such as the UN Number. See Freight Forwarding.
Equipment Number
The trailer, container, or railcar number recorded against a receiving order. Carries through to inventory, so stock can be traced back to the load it arrived on.
Global Warehouse Context
Lets you filter everything you see — inventory, orders, receiving — down to one selected warehouse at a time.
LPN Warning Badge
A colored badge on an LPN flagging something the handler needs to know before moving it. Three appear during load planning:
Picker Attribution
The record of which user picked a given LPN, stored alongside any notes the picker left. Answers "who picked this?" when a shipment is queried.
Product Submission
A proposed new product awaiting review, rather than one added to the catalog directly. Lets customers or staff submit products for approval. See Product Submissions.
Rate Quote
A freight forwarding price quote for a prospective shipment. See Freight Forwarding.
Sales Rep
The sales representative assigned to a customer account. An optional field on the customer record. See Customer Management.
Storage Class
A user-defined code on a product (A, B, C, FRAGILE, OVERSIZED, or whatever your operation uses) that controls where it may be put away. A location carries a matching storage class restriction, and putaway only offers locations whose restriction matches the product's class. The values are yours to define — the platform enforces the match, not the meaning.
Warehouse
A building where goods are stored and shipped out from.
Warehouse Switching
Changing which warehouse you're viewing or working in without signing out and back in.
WMS (Warehouse Management System)
Software that runs day-to-day warehouse operations — receiving, storage, picking, and shipping. Zora is a WMS.

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