Follow every box from the moment it is discharged off the vessel to the day it returns empty to the yard — with a vessel/voyage dashboard, a colour-coded journey timeline per container, automatic demurrage & detention, and one-click import of the carrier’s gate reports from Excel.
Applies to Ritzy Shipping v8.0.2.5 and later | Audience: Operations, Liner & Admin users | Sign in as ADMIN
1 What is Container Tracking?
Container Tracking is a companion screen to the Liner module. Where the liner job records the booking, the bills of lading and the containers, Container Tracking records what happens to each container over time — discharged, gated out, delivered to the consignee, returned empty, and so on — and turns that history into live status, progress bars and demurrage charges.
See the whole fleet at a glance — a dashboard of cards, one per vessel & voyage, showing how many containers are still out and how many are home.
Track each box — a colour-coded timeline of the container’s journey, where you stamp each step as it happens.
Bill automatically — demurrage and detention are worked out from those stamps and the free days you allow.
Save typing — import the carrier’s daily Gate Out and yard Stock reports straight from Excel; the system matches each container and stamps the event for you.
Where the data comes from
Container Tracking reads the same containers you already enter on the Liner job’s Bill of Lading and Containers tabs — you don’t re-key anything. It only adds the events (the journey).
2 The container journey & status colours
Every container moves through a fixed sequence of events. The sequence depends on the job direction — an import container (discharged here and returned to the yard) versus an export container (picked up empty, stuffed and sailed).
Import containers (Liner Import)
1 · Discharged2 · Gate Out Full3 · With Consignee4 · Return Empty5 · Gate In Empty
Across the dashboard and the timeline, the same three colours always mean the same thing:
Done — the event has been stamped Pending — not reached yet Attention — overdue / still out
A container is counted as delivered / home once it reaches the last stage for its direction — Gate In Empty for imports, Sailed for exports.
Events are a permanent log
Each stamp is added to a history (it is never overwritten), and the container’s current status is simply its most recent event. That’s why importing the same report twice is safe — an event that is already there is skipped.
3 Opening Container Tracking
Container Tracking runs in its own window so it can’t slow down or interfere with the main application.
Sign in to Ritzy Shipping as ADMIN (or any user with Liner access).
From the main menu, open Transactions → Container Tracking.
The Container Tracking window opens maximised and lands on the Dashboard.
You can also jump straight to a single voyage from inside a liner job by clicking Container Tracking on the job’s container panel — that opens the same window focused on that job’s voyage.
It’s a separate window
Because it opens as its own program, you can leave Container Tracking open beside the main screen and switch between them with the taskbar.
4 The Dashboard — vessel & voyage tiles
The Dashboard is the landing page. A strip of KPI totals sits above a wall of cards — one card per vessel and voyage, split by direction (Import / Export). Each card shows how that voyage is progressing.
Reading a card
Vessel name is the headline, with the voyage number just beneath it.
A coloured side-stripe and badge show the direction — blue = Import, orange = Export.
The counts line shows containers and jobs on that voyage.
The green progress bar and “X of Y delivered” show how many containers have completed their journey.
Click anywhere on the card to drill into the voyage.
The Dashboard — a coloured action toolbar and a filter row above the KPI totals and the vessel/voyage cards. Back is greyed here because the Dashboard is the home page.
The activity toolbar
The Dashboard is the launch pad for everything. A row of coloured buttons sits near the top:
Button
What it does
Refresh
Re-read the latest data and redraw the cards.
Status Board
Open the container status board for the voyages currently in view (see §5).
Demurrage / Detention
Open the demurrage/detention screen for the voyages currently in view (see §6).
Tariff Setup
Maintain the free-days / rate tariff master (see §6).
Import Gate Events
Import the carrier’s Gate Out / yard Stock reports from Excel (see §8).
Getting around — Back & Close
Every screen shows a ◀ Back button on the top-left (like a web browser) and a ✕ Close button on the top-right. Back is greyed out on the Dashboard (you’re already home) and takes you one step back everywhere else. The window only closes from the Dashboard — from any other screen, closing simply steps you back instead, so you never lose your place by accident.
Filtering the wall
Filter
What it does
Vessel
Show only one vessel’s voyages. Defaults to All vessels.
Line
Show only one shipping line. Defaults to All lines.
From
Earliest job date to include (defaults to the last 90 days, so the screen never scans your whole history).
Show
All directions, Import only, or Export only.
Voyage No.
Type part of a voyage number to narrow the cards instantly.
Container No.
Type a container number to show only the voyage(s) that container is on — handy for “where is this box?”. The container counts on each card stay accurate.
The title sits on top; all the filters line up in a single row beneath it. The Vessel and Line lists only contain values that actually appear on your jobs, so they stay short. Click Refresh any time to re-read the latest data.
Two vessels, same voyage number?
Because the cards are keyed on vessel + voyage (not voyage alone), two different vessels that happen to share a voyage number stay on separate cards and never get mixed together.
5 Drilling into a voyage & stamping events
Click a card to open the voyage. You’ll see the jobs and containers on that voyage; pick a container to open its journey timeline.
The journey timeline
The timeline lists the stages for that container’s direction in order. Completed stages are green with the date; the next stage to do carries a Stamp button.
Container CICU4088022 · 40′ HC · Import
Job LI-2026-0123 • PACIFIC MERIDIAN / 2616E • BL SAMPLE-002251
Discharged
Stamped 24-Jun-2026 06:30 — off the vessel
DONE
Gate Out Full
Stamped 29-Jun-2026 13:13 — left the port
DONE
With Consignee
Not stamped yet · Stamp
PENDING
Return Empty
Not stamped yet
PENDING
Gate In Empty
Not stamped yet
PENDING
Stamping a step
Click Stamp on the next pending step.
Set the Date and Time the event actually happened (defaults to now), and optionally a Reference and Remarks.
Confirm. The step turns green, and the timeline refreshes immediately.
Stamps update everything downstream
As soon as you stamp a step, the container’s status on the Dashboard, the voyage progress bar, and the demurrage/detention clocks all update from that one action.
Along the top of the voyage you’ll find Status Board and Demurrage / Detention buttons for that voyage; the ◀ Back button (top-left) returns you to the Dashboard.
The Status Board
The Status Board is a grid overview — one row per container, one column per lifecycle stage, each cell showing when that stage was reached. It’s ideal for spotting, at a glance, which containers are lagging.
“In-stock only” — what’s still with the customer
Tick In-stock only to hide containers that have already left the customer’s stock — returned empty on import (Gate In Empty) or boarded for export (Loaded / Sailed). What remains is exactly what the customer is still holding.
Container Status Board
Export to ExcelIn-stock only (not yet boarded / returned)
Container No
Job No
ISO
Discharged
Gate Out Full
With Consignee
Gate In Empty
CICU4088022
LI-2026-0123
45G1
24/06 06:30
29/06 13:13
TCLU7761234
LI-2026-0123
22G1
24/06 06:30
27/06 09:05
28/06
The Status Board — with In-stock only ticked, boarded / returned containers are hidden. Export to Excel sits on top.
6 Demurrage, detention & Free Days
Demurrage and detention are charged for the days a container sits beyond its allowed free days. The system measures the days between two events and bills the excess.
Charge
Clock runs from → to
Demurrage (import)
Discharged → Gate Out Full
Detention (import)
Gate Out Full → Gate In Empty
Detention (export)
Empty Pickup → Gate In Full
Where free days come from
There are two levels, and the more specific one wins:
Tariff master (the standard). Your shipping-line tariff sets the normal free days — for example 14 days — per line, container type and charge.
Per-BL override (when negotiated). If a customer negotiates different free days for a particular shipment, enter that number once on the bill of lading and it overrides the standard for every container on that BL.
Entering a per-BL override
The override lives on the liner job’s Bill of Lading line, in a new Free Days field:
Liner Job — Bill of Lading
Bill of Lading
SAMPLE-002251
SKY
FCL/FCL
21
The bill of lading carries an optional Free Days override. Leave it blank to use the tariff standard.
Blank means “use the standard”
Leave Free Days empty on a BL and the tariff-master figure (e.g. 14) applies. Enter a number — say 21 — and that BL’s containers get 21 free days instead. The change flows into the next demurrage/detention calculation automatically.
7 Auto-“Discharged” on import jobs
For import jobs, the first event — Discharged — is the same for every container on the job (they all come off the same vessel). So you don’t have to stamp it one box at a time.
When you save a Liner Import job, every container on it is automatically stamped Discharged, dated the Job Date. This is completely safe to repeat:
It only adds Discharged to containers that don’t already have it — saving again never creates duplicates.
You can still refine the exact discharge date later (for example by importing the Gate Out report in the next section, which carries the real discharge date/time).
Why this matters
Because every imported container starts at Discharged, the demurrage clock is already ticking from day one — and the gate reports only need to add what happens next.
8 Importing gate events from Excel
Carriers and depots send daily spreadsheets — a Gate Out Port report (containers that left the port) and a yard Stock Report (empties back in the yard). Instead of stamping each one by hand, import the file and let the system match and stamp every container.
What each report stamps
Report
Recognised by its tab named…
Stamps
Gate Out Port (e.g. Daily Report)
“Gate Out”
Discharged (refined to the report’s date) + Gate Out Full
Gate In Yard (Stock Report)
“Stock Report”
Gate In Empty
You use the same button for both — it looks inside the file and works out which report it is, so you never pick the type yourself.
How to import
On the Dashboard, click Import Gate Events (top-right).
Choose the Excel file the carrier/depot sent.
The system reads it, matches each container to the right job, stamps the events, and shows a summary.
Unmatched (no open import container awaiting this event):
TEMU5566778 CAIU1234567 MSKU9988776
After import, a summary reports how many were stamped, how many were already there, and lists any containers it couldn’t match.
How matching works
The reports only give a container number, so the system finds the right shipment for you — it picks the most recent import container that is still waiting for that event:
Gate Out attaches to a container that has been discharged but not yet gated out.
Gate In attaches to a container that is out (gated out / with consignee / returning) but not yet back empty.
Anything it can’t place — a container that isn’t on any open job, or one that already passed that stage — is listed under Unmatched so you can check it. Nothing is guessed, and nothing is changed for unmatched rows.
Safe to re-run
The yard Stock Report is a snapshot of everything currently in the yard, so the same containers reappear each day. Re-importing is harmless — any event already recorded is counted under Already present and skipped.
Tab names can vary
Detection is by the worksheet (tab) name, not the file name, and it’s flexible — “GATE_OUT”, “Gate Out”, “Stock Report”, “BSS Stock Report” are all recognised — so a carrier renaming a tab won’t break the import.
9 Recommended day-to-day workflow
One-time setup (admin): make sure each shipping line’s tariff has the right free days and rates.
New import job: enter the BL(s) and containers as usual and Save — every container is auto-stamped Discharged. Add a Free Days override on any BL the customer negotiated.
Each morning: open Container Tracking → Import Gate Events and load the carrier’s Gate Out report, then the yard Stock report. Review the summary’s Unmatched list.
Exceptions: for anything not on a report, open the voyage, pick the container, and Stamp the step by hand.
Manager view: scan the Dashboard — cards with low progress bars are the voyages with containers still out.
10 Tips & FAQ
I imported the same report twice — did I double-stamp?
No. Events already recorded are skipped and counted under Already present. Only genuinely new events are added.
A container shows as “Unmatched” — why?
Either it isn’t on any open import job in the system, or it has already passed the stage the report is trying to stamp. Check the container number and the job before stamping it by hand.
My customer gets 21 free days, not the standard 14. Where do I set that?
On the liner job’s Bill of Lading line, type 21 in Free Days. It overrides the tariff for every container on that BL. Leave it blank to use the tariff standard.
Two of my vessels share a voyage number. Will they merge on the dashboard?
No — cards are grouped by vessel and voyage, so each vessel keeps its own card.
Do I have to stamp “Discharged” for every box?
No. Saving a Liner Import job stamps Discharged for all its containers automatically (dated the job date). Importing the Gate Out report can later refine that to the exact discharge date.
Can a liner job be cancelled once its boxes are being tracked?
No. Liner jobs are cancelled rather than deleted, and only while none of their containers has a tracking event beyond the automatic Discharged stamp — the events recorded here happened, and a cancelled job would leave them explaining nothing. Cancelling removes the Discharged stamps, so the boxes drop out of tracking.
The Dashboard looks empty.
Check the From date (it defaults to the last 90 days) and the Vessel/Line/Show filters, then click Refresh.