Every logistics director knows the frustration. You’ve optimised your delivery operations, streamlined your carrier integrations, and your team runs a tight ship. Yet your monthly platform costs remain stubbornly high, seemingly disconnected from your actual shipping volumes. Meanwhile, you suspect that competitors with chaotic operations and inefficient systems are somehow paying the same rates you are.

The culprit? Traditional per-label pricing that ignores the vast differences in how businesses actually use delivery management platforms. One retailer might make five API calls per shipment while another makes 60, yet both pay identical fees. It’s the logistics equivalent of paying the same electricity bill whether you run a laptop or a server farm.

Why traditional pricing models are breaking modern logistics

The global logistics market reached $11.43 trillion in 2022 and is projected to exceed $13 trillion by 2026 (Armstrong & Associates, 2024). Yet despite this massive scale, most businesses can’t accurately attribute their technology costs to actual usage. This opacity creates a fundamental unfairness that punishes efficient operators while subsidising wasteful practices.

Consider the real computational costs behind modern delivery management. When Sorted processes a shipment, it’s not just generating a label. The platform orchestrates carrier selection across 700+ carriers, manages real-time tracking updates, triggers customer communications, handles exceptions and provides analytics. Each of these actions consumes computational resources, but traditional pricing pretends they’re all equal.

The problem intensifies as delivery management becomes more sophisticated. Today’s customers expect real-time visibility, proactive notifications and seamless returns processes. Meeting these expectations requires continuous API calls, webhook processing and data synchronisation. Yet per-label pricing treats a simple domestic shipment the same as a complex international delivery with multiple tracking events and customer touchpoints.

The Sorted approach: Action Transaction Units (ATUs)

We recognised this fundamental pricing flaw and engineered a solution: Action Transaction Units (ATUs). Rather than charging flat fees per label, Sorted’s ATU model prices each platform action based on its actual computational cost. It’s transparent, fair, and most importantly, gives logistics teams complete control over their costs.

Think of ATUs as the fuel for a metaphorical delivery engine. Different actions require different amounts of fuel based on their computational intensity. Here’s what makes our implementation unique:

Granular action tracking: Unlike competitors who might track basic API calls, Sorted’s platform monitors every discrete action across the entire delivery lifecycle. For example, creating a label might cost 10 ATUs, while a simple tracking check costs just one ATU. Complex operations like multi-carrier rate shopping or international customs documentation cost proportionally more.

Real-time visibility: Sorted’s dashboard provides live ATU consumption data, not monthly surprises. Logistics teams can see exactly which integrations, carriers or processes consume the most resources. This immediate feedback loop enables rapid optimisation.

Intelligent optimisation tools: Our platform doesn’t just show you consumption, it actively helps reduce it. Built-in efficiency recommendations identify wasteful patterns like redundant API calls or inefficient webhook configurations. The platform can even automatically optimise certain processes to minimise ATU usage without compromising functionality.

Why does this approach beat traditional approaches?

While other platforms have experimented with usage-based pricing, our implementation stands apart through three key differentiators:

1. Platform-wide integration: ATUs aren’t bolted onto existing infrastructure; they’re fundamental to how Sorted’s platform operates. Every feature, from the core API to advanced analytics, is designed with ATU efficiency in mind. This means using our platform naturally guides you toward efficient practices.

2. Predictable scaling: Our solution provides detailed ATU calculators and forecasting tools that eliminate billing surprises. Before implementing any new integration or process, you can model its exact ATU impact. This predictability is crucial for enterprises managing thousands of daily shipments.

3. Efficiency incentives: Traditional platforms profit from inefficiency – more API calls mean more infrastructure costs passed to all customers. Sorted’s model aligns incentives correctly. When customers optimise their integrations, both parties benefit through reduced computational load and lower costs.

Demonstrable business outcomes

Companies migrating to Sorted’s ATU model typically see immediate cost reductions, but the real value comes from operational improvements. Independent research shows that businesses implementing transparent, usage-based logistics solutions achieve an average ROI of 251% over three years, primarily through improved visibility and decision-making capabilities (Transportation Insight/Forrester, 2021).

For Sorted customers specifically, the results are even more compelling:

Cost reduction: By eliminating the hidden subsidy efficient operators provide to inefficient users, ATU pricing ensures costs directly reflect actual platform usage. Businesses with streamlined integrations see immediate savings.

Integration efficiency: Clear visibility into API consumption reveals optimisation opportunities previously hidden by per-label pricing. Development teams can systematically reduce unnecessary calls, consolidate requests, and streamline data flows to minimise ATU usage.

Performance improvements: Optimised integrations deliver benefits beyond cost reduction. When businesses streamline their API usage to reduce ATU consumption, they eliminate redundant calls that slow down systems. This creates faster checkout experiences, reduces timeout errors and improves overall platform reliability. The efficiency gains compound – what starts as cost optimisation becomes a performance advantage that enhances the entire customer journey.

Strategic insights: With detailed consumption breakdowns, businesses gain visibility into previously hidden inefficiencies. Monthly ATU statements expose which integrations, carriers, or processes consume disproportionate resources, enabling targeted optimisation.

These improvements align with broader industry trends. Companies implementing full supply chain visibility report 40-60% fewer customer service enquiries about delivery tracking (Business Money, 2025), a benefit that Sorted’s transparent ATU model directly enables through optimised tracking implementations.

Deep dive: Sorted’s ATU architecture

Sorted’s ATU system leverages sophisticated metering technology originally developed for cloud infrastructure management. Here’s what makes it uniquely powerful for logistics:

Micro-transaction tracking: Every API call, webhook trigger, notification send and data query is logged with microsecond precision. This granularity ensures complete accuracy in cost attribution.

Carrier-specific optimisation: Sorted’s platform understands that different carriers require different integration patterns. The ATU model accounts for this, ensuring you’re not penalised for a carrier’s inefficient API design. Sorted’s middleware layer can even batch and optimise carrier communications to reduce your ATU consumption.

Smart caching: The platform intelligently caches frequently accessed data like tracking information. Since tracking requests often check the same shipment multiple times before delivery, this caching significantly reduces redundant carrier API calls and their associated ATU costs.

Batch processing options: For non-urgent operations, Sorted offers batch processing at reduced ATU rates. End-of-day reports, historical analytics and bulk updates can be queued for off-peak processing, further reducing costs.

Unlike generic API management platforms, Sorted’s ATU infrastructure is purpose-built for logistics workflows. The system understands the difference between a critical shipping label request and a routine tracking update, prioritising resources accordingly.

Expert perspective: Building for efficiency

“When we designed the ATU model, we weren’t just solving a pricing problem,” explains Paul Hill, Sorted’s Product Director. “We were addressing a fundamental misalignment in how logistics technology is consumed and paid for. Traditional pricing models actually encourage inefficiency because there’s no incentive to optimise.”

The team’s analysis revealed the scale of the problem: one customer might make five API calls per shipment while another makes 60, yet both traditionally pay the same per-label rate. This disparity in resource consumption drove the development of ATUs.

“The revelation was that most businesses don’t realise they’re being inefficient,” says Paul. “They’ve never had visibility into their actual platform consumption. With ATUs, yes we provide fair pricing, but also the tools to become radically more efficient.”

This efficiency mindset permeates our entire platform. Every new feature is evaluated for its ATU impact, ensuring that innovation doesn’t come at the cost of efficiency. Paul Hill explains three key principles that keep ATU pricing transparent:

Carrier complexity shield

“You’re charged for your intended action, not carrier API inefficiency. If we need five API calls to process your label with Carrier X versus one call with Carrier Y, you still pay the same ATU cost for label generation.

Performance-pricing separation

“Our smart caching accelerates your experience but doesn’t affect your billing. Whether data comes from cache or live carrier feed, your ATU consumption remains predictable.”

Architectural honesty

“Batch operations aren’t ‘discounted’. They genuinely require fewer resources per action. ATUs reflect real computational costs, not artificial pricing tiers.”

Getting started with Sorted’s ATU model

Ready to stop subsidising inefficient competitors? Transitioning to Sorted’s ATU-based pricing model starts with understanding your current usage patterns and identifying optimisation opportunities.

Our team can help you evaluate how ATU pricing would work for your specific integration patterns and shipping volumes. They’ll work with you to understand your current delivery management costs and demonstrate how transparent, usage-based pricing could benefit your operations.

To explore how our ATU model could transform your delivery management costs, contact the Sorted team. They can provide detailed information about implementation, pricing structures, and the specific benefits for your business based on your shipping profile and integration requirements.

The logistics industry is evolving beyond one-size-fits-all pricing. With Sorted’s ATU model, you’re not just getting transparent pricing – you’re gaining a competitive advantage through operational efficiency that compounds over time.