Fast-growing Tennessee-based Vesta Freight standardized execution, visibility, and carrier fraud prevention with ongoing risk management using Descartes’ transportation platform. Vesta implemented Descartes 3G TMS™ for transportation execution and financial control, Descartes MacroPoint™ for real-time visibility and in-transit fraud
detection, and Descartes MyCarrierPortal™ for streamlined carrier vetting (including driver and VIN verification), onboarding, monitoring, and fraud prevention. With the integrated solution, the company quickly grew shipment volume by 18x in a difficult transportation market. Additionally, as Vesta rolled out new services, such as managed transportation, Descartes easily supported those complex requirements natively without Vesta needing new systems.
As we grew our company from a startup shipping 100 loads per month to a thriving brokerage moving thousands of shipments, our lightweight
TMS and manual processes were no longer feasible. By moving to Descartes’ integrated transportation platform with real-time visibility and
multi-dimensional freight security, everything we do now—from load execution and carrier vetting to invoicing and customer communication—is automated, streamlined, and protected.
Challenge: Scaling High-touch Service While Reducing Fraud Exposure
Vesta’s mission is to solve complex logistics challenges by providing transportation excellence to both shippers and carriers with every shipment, transaction, and interaction. The company’s industry-aligned, pod-based model reduces handoffs and creates accountability across its portfolio of services, including full truckload (FTL), less-than-truckload (LTL), and intermodal modes. Vesta’s “starter” out-of-the-box transportation management system (TMS) was initially sufficient but lacked the automation, responsiveness, and real-time freight visibility required to support evolving requirements across operations, accounting, communications, and analytics.
As the company expanded into multiple verticals and increased shipment volume, Vesta needed a technology foundation that could scale without compromising service. Manual processes and disconnected systems could not keep pace with customer expectations for real-time updates and complex cost allocations, while the continued rise in cargo theft raised the stakes for carrier onboarding, shipment monitoring, and secure execution. Plus, siloed financial applications and manual invoicing were adding friction to the accounts payable and receivable (AP/AR) process and impeding efficient cash flow.
Solution: Integrated Descartes Stack Optimizes Execution, Visibility & Carrier Management
Vesta differentiates itself by delivering premium service to both shippers and carriers (~20,000 carriers with hundreds of new carriers onboarded weekly) where each load has one accountable point of contact across quoting, booking, tracking, and issue resolution. To maintain this level of service and protect customers amidst escalating freight fraud, Vesta standardized on an integrated Descartes transportation platform, including:
- Descartes 3G TMS — System of record for transportation execution, order management, communication, financial workflows, and analytics; supports management-by-exception and consistent processes across pods.
- Descartes MacroPoint — Real-time tracking and in-transit fraud detection with shareable customer links and broad carrier compliance (mobile and ELD), reducing check calls and improving customer transparency.
- Descartes MyCarrierPortal — Carrier vetting (with driver and VIN verification), onboarding, and monitoring to reduce fraud and unsafe carrier liability exposure.
- Back-office optimization — Descartes 3G TMS automates invoicing and integration with QuickBooks enables faster billing and payment cycles and better visibility into AP/AR details.
Implementation of the combined Descartes solution was efficient and smooth.
We couldn’t afford a two- to three-month deployment because we had customers waiting to ship with us. With Descartes 3G TMS, we focused on building repeatable standard operating procedures (SOPs) and were covering loads in a matter of days followed later on by the rollout of Descartes MacroPoint and Descartes MyCarrierPortal within weeks. We were able to train our distributed team quickly and start shipping without a delay.
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In addition to real-time visibility into shipments and shareable live tracking links (which customers love), Descartes MacroPoint’s carrier lookup tool gives us access to historical performance and risk profile information using DOT numbers or driver phone numbers: How many loads have they tracked to date? What are the last 10 orders they tracked? Do they have any spoofed orders? This is a phenomenal tool that gives us peace of mind and gives customers the assurance that we take protecting their freight very seriously.
Descartes MyCarrierPortal adds an additional layer of fraud prevention, verifying driver identity and equipment authenticity in one automated process. Drivers submit a photo of their truck’s VIN, which is automatically geotagged and timestamped, verifying that the vehicle is at the expected pickup location. The system cross-references the VIN with registered carrier data, flagging mismatches that indicate unauthorized subcontracting or identity misuse. “Live-time VIN validation really cuts down on carrier identity fraud—an escalating problem in the industry,” adds Nick Cicero, CEO at Vesta Freight. “Freight fraud is the one thing that keeps me up at night; Descartes lets me sleep.”
The Descartes platform also transformed Vesta’s finance operations, automating invoicing and integrating accounting workflows to increase accuracy, reduce manual work, and accelerate cash flow. “I used to spend two full days creating invoices manually. Now, with invoices automatically sent to customers, built-in auditing, and QuickBooks integration, I don’t waste time generating and chasing invoices,” explains Jasmine Birdsong, Senior Accountant at Vesta Freight. “Plus, integrated customer account statements improve transparency, help us get paid faster, and strengthen customer trust.”
We take every step in terms of security because our customers mean that much to us—we’re going to treat your freight like it’s our freight.
Excellent customer service and creative problem solving are hallmarks of Vesta’s strategy and the Descartes solution helps the company collaborate with customers to deliver solutions for complex problems. Cicero expands, “When we’re doing training, I always explain that we currently use a small percentage of the system’s capabilities and that there’s much more available to us. So, when a customer brings you an opportunity, it’s never a no. It’s let us get with our partner, let us figure out what this looks like and the ROI for us. Descartes 3G TMS is not just a TMS for a brokerage.
Vesta is constantly looking to add more value to our customers and get deeper into their business, and I’m thrilled with the capabilities that I see in Descartes 3G TMS that are aligned with our longer-term strategy to offer more transportation management services for our customers.
The Results
- Reduced Fraud Exposure: The Descartes solution supports consistent carrier qualification at scale with automated vetting, onboarding, and monitoring. VIN validation and carrier intelligence reduce the risk of fraudulent pickups. Carrier lookups and risk profiles provide tracking compliance history, as well as red flags.
- Enhanced Shipper & Carrier Relationships: With Descartes’ real-time visibility and sophisticated fraud protection, Vesta offers customers proactive updates, vital information on the carrier coming to pick up loads, live tracking access, and 24/7 support, minimizing risk for carriers and shippers alike.
- Scalable Operations Support Accelerated Growth: While leveraging the solution to support 18x shipment volume growth, Vesta simultaneously built standardized SOPs and training around the Descartes tech stack, supporting its distributed operating model with consistent execution and meeting customer-specific service level agreements (SLAs) and reporting needs with ease.
- Faster, More Accurate Financial Execution: Vesta freed up two days of finance team effort per week and accelerated payment cycles with automated invoicing and QuickBooks integration. Better AP/AR visibility helps the team easily audit charges, prevent duplicate payments, and break out charges for larger customers with separate business units that require allocations to provide cost visibility into different departments.
