Price a whole RFP in Excel, from real carrier bids
Cargado market rates come back as formulas in your own bid file. Map your file's wording once, fill down, and every Mexico and CanadaCanada and Mexico lane gets a low, mid and high, a confidence label and a margin of error.
Included with your Cargado plan. Your Microsoft 365 admin adds it once for the whole company, then everyone signs in with their own Cargado login.
Your bid file, priced from what carriers actually bid
The add-in reads the same market rates as the Cargado app. You keep working in the sheet your customer sent.
Stay in your own sheet
Rates arrive as formulas beside the lanes you are quoting. Map the RFP's wording once, fill one row down, and the whole file prices itself. No copying between tabs.
Real carrier bids
Low, mid and high are the 25th, 50th and 75th percentile of what carriers bid on the Cargado marketplace over the trailing 12 weeks, fuel included. The same numbers the app shows.
Know which numbers to trust
Every lane comes with a confidence label, the score behind it and a margin of error in dollars and percent. A thin lane is obvious before you quote it.
Per load, per mile or all-in
Each band also comes per mile and as an all-in rate, so it drops straight into whichever column your bid sheet uses.
History in one cell
A text sparkline of the mid rate's weekly history fits in a single cell and survives a copy-paste into anyone's workbook.
Built for border crossings
Price a Mexico lane through the crossing you name, or leave it blank and Cargado uses its recommended crossing. Canada lanes price too.
One sheet, every field Cargado returnsEvery field Cargado returns
Pick a lane, trailer and crossing for the selected row, switch between rate, per mile and all-in, then fill down. Click any field below to see its formula.
Each lane in your bid file gets these fields, each from its own formula.
Sample lanes and rates in an example workbook. Your rates come from the live marketplace.
- Low, mid and high
RATE_HISTORY_P25 · _P50 · _P75The 25th, 50th and 75th percentile of carrier bids on the lane over the trailing 12 weeks, fuel included.
- Per mile and all-in
RATE_HISTORY_PER_MILE_P50 · RATE_HISTORY_ALL_IN_P50The same bands per mile or all-in. The default rate uses whichever of the two Cargado's analysis picks for the lane.
- Confidence
RATE_CONFIDENCE · RATE_CONFIDENCE_SCORESTRONG, MEDIUM or LOWER, plus the 1 to 100 score behind it if you would rather set your own cutoff.
- Margin of error
RATE_MARGIN_OF_ERROR · RATE_RELATIVE_MARGIN_OF_ERRORHow far the true median could sit from the one Cargado observed, in dollars and as a share of the mid.
- History in one cell
RATE_HISTORY_P50_SPARKLINEThe mid rate's weekly history drawn in text, so it lives in a single cell.
- Recommended crossing
RECOMMENDED_BORDER_CROSSINGThe crossing Cargado recommends for a Mexico lane. Leave Crossing blank and the lane prices through it.
- Route miles and markets
RATE_ROUTE_MILES · RATE_ORIGIN_MARKET_NAMEThe distance and the market each end matched, so you can see what the lookup used. Leave Miles blank and Cargado works it out.
- No number on a thin lane
No rates found for the given inputWhen Cargado has no rate for a lane and trailer, the cell says so instead of guessing.
Built for the people who answer RFPs
Pricing teams
Brokers, 3PLs and forwarders pricing a Mexico or CanadaCanada or Mexico tender can price the whole lane list the day it lands, and see which lanes need a closer look.
Account and carrier sales
Anyone quoting from a spreadsheet gets the same number the app shows, so a rate quoted from Excel matches the rate in Cargado.
Shippers building a bid file
Set target rates on every lane before the bids come back, and see where your current rates sit in the market.
Up and running in three steps
Your admin adds it once
Your Microsoft 365 admin deploys the add-in from Microsoft AppSource for the whole company. Nobody else installs anything.
You sign in
Click Show Cargado on the Home tab and log in with the same Cargado account you use in the app. There is no API key to set up.
Map your terms, fill down
Tell Cargado what your RFP calls each trailer and crossing, then fill one row down your lane list.
Questions about the Excel add-in
Is the add-in included with my plan?
Are these the same rates as the Cargado app?
What happens on a lane without enough bids?
What currency do rates come back in?
Can I send a priced workbook to a teammate?
Price your next RFP in Excel
See the add-in on your own lanes, or start with Cargado today.
CARGADO ADD-IN FOR EXCEL
Price Canada and Mexico lanes in Excel, from real carrier bids
Market rates come back as formulas in your own bid file. Low, mid and high bands, a confidence score and a margin of error, sitting beside the lanes you are already quoting.
Included with a Cargado subscription. Your Microsoft 365 administrator installs it once for the whole company.
SETTING IT UP
One install by your administrator, then a sign-in
The add-in is published on Microsoft AppSource. An administrator deploys it to your organization once, and it appears on the Home ribbon for everyone who needs it.
For your Microsoft 365 administrator
- Get the add-in from Microsoft AppSource
Open the Cargado Add-in for Excel listing and choose Get it now.
- Deploy it to your organization
Entire organization is the setting we recommend. Each person then signs in with a Cargado account to use it.
- Give it up to 24 hours
Microsoft can take that long to show a newly deployed add-in to every user. Forward the announcement email and the user guide to your team.
Step-by-step screenshots for each of these are in the installation guide.
For everyone else, the first time you open it
- Click Show Cargado on the Home ribbon
On the single-line ribbon layout it sits inside the overflow menu. The Cargado task pane opens on the right.
- Log in with your Cargado account
The same username and password you use in the web app. If Excel asks to display a new window, allow it.
- Click Create sheets
That adds two sheets to the workbook: Cargado Mappings and Cargado Rates. If either sheet is already there, Create sheets skips creating them and nothing is overwritten.
USING IT ON A BID FILE
Teach it your wording once, then fill down
Every RFP names trailer types and crossings differently. You reconcile that once per workbook, and the rest of the bid file is formulas.
In the Cargado Mappings sheet, put your spreadsheet's wording for each trailer type and border crossing next to Cargado's. A VLOOKUP translates them from then on. Leave a row blank for anything you do not run.
In the Cargado Rates sheet, fill in origin, destination, trailer type and, for a Mexico lane, the crossing. The mapped values appear to the right, and the rate result to the right of those, so you can see exactly what the lookup matched on.
Once the mapping is right, skip the Cargado Rates sheet and call the functions directly in the RFP tab. Fill down and the whole bid file prices itself.
WHAT COMES BACK
A band, and enough context to argue with it
Cargado returns the rate and the reasoning. You can see how confident the number is, how wide the error is, and which market, trailer category and crossing it matched, so a thin lane is obvious before you quote it.
The rate
The 25th, 50th and 75th percentile of what carriers have actually bid on the lane.
Every band also comes as a rate per mile and as an all-in rate, so you can drop it straight into whichever column your bid sheet uses.
A sparkline of the mid rate, drawn in text so it lives in a single cell and survives a copy-paste into someone else's workbook.
How much to trust it
Strong, medium or lower, with the underlying score if you would rather set your own threshold.
In dollars and as a percentage of the rate. A wide margin on a lane you are about to commit to is the signal to go look at it.
Origin and destination market, whether each is a standard or extended market, trailer category, the crossing used and the route miles. Plus the recommended crossing when you are not sure which to quote.
Rates are built from carrier bids submitted on the Cargado marketplace, aggregated by origin and destination market, trailer type and border crossing. How the rate data works and how confidence scores are calculated cover the method in full.
FUNCTION REFERENCE
The formulas you can call
Every function takes the same arguments: origin, destination and trailer type, plus the border crossing where a Mexico lane needs one. Miles are optional; leave them out and Cargado works out the distance.
| Function | What it returns |
|---|---|
| CARGADO.RATE_HISTORY_P25 _P50 · _P75 | The low, mid and high rate for the lane. |
| CARGADO.RATE_HISTORY_PER_MILE_P25 _P50 · _P75 | The same three bands expressed as a rate per mile. |
| CARGADO.RATE_HISTORY_ALL_IN_P25 _P50 · _P75 | The same three bands as an all-in rate. |
| CARGADO.RATE_HISTORY_P50_SPARKLINE | The mid rate's history as a single text sparkline, so it fits in one cell. |
| CARGADO.RATE_CONFIDENCE | Strong, medium or lower. |
| CARGADO.RATE_CONFIDENCE_SCORE | The numeric score behind that label. |
| CARGADO.RATE_MARGIN_OF_ERROR | The margin of error in dollars. |
| CARGADO.RATE_RELATIVE_MARGIN_OF_ERROR | The margin of error as a percentage of the rate. |
| CARGADO.RATE_ORIGIN_MARKET_NAME RATE_DESTINATION_MARKET_NAME | The market Cargado matched each end of the lane to. |
| CARGADO.RATE_ORIGIN_MARKET_TYPE RATE_DESTINATION_MARKET_TYPE | Whether that market is a standard or an extended one. |
| CARGADO.RATE_ORIGIN_MARKET_CODE RATE_DESTINATION_MARKET_CODE | The market code, for joining back to your own data. |
| CARGADO.RATE_TRAILER_CATEGORY | The trailer category the rate was priced on. |
| CARGADO.RATE_BORDER_CROSSING | The crossing used in the lookup. |
| CARGADO.RECOMMENDED_BORDER_CROSSING | The crossing Cargado would recommend for the route and trailer type. |
| CARGADO.RATE_ROUTE_MILES | The route distance in miles. |
| CARGADO.RATE_CURRENCY_CODE | The currency the rate is quoted in. |
The user guide lists every argument in full.
BEFORE YOU ROLL IT OUT
Two things worth knowing
Who can use it
Your Microsoft 365 administrator installs it for the company. To pull rates, you sign in with your Cargado account, the same login you use in the web app.
Pricing teams, carrier sales and anyone who lives in a bid file. It reads the same rates as the web app, so a number quoted in Excel matches the number quoted in Cargado.
How usage is counted
Recalculating a lane you already priced this week does not count as a new lookup, however many times Excel recalculates it.
What counts against your plan, and what happens when you reach the limit, is covered in Plan limits and usage warnings.
Questions about the Excel Add-In
What brokers ask before rolling it out to a pricing team.
No. Create sheets adds two sheets to your workbook, Cargado Mappings and Cargado Rates. If either is already there, it skips creating them and nothing is overwritten. The functions also work in any tab of your workbook.