You can ask a chatbot for an HS code, and for a clear description it will often be right. Here is what a brokerage needs that a chat window does not give, and how Tariffly compares with the other tools you might be considering.
ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Copilot used directly, one question at a time.
| What a customs desk needs | General chatbot | Tariffly |
|---|---|---|
| Australian 8-digit item, stat code and duty rate | Often guessed or invented; models cannot see the current Working Tariff and routinely produce codes that do not exist. | Chosen only from the real items in the published Schedule 3, with the version recorded on every line. |
| Reads the whole shipment, not one product | You paste one description at a time, then retype the answer. | Upload the invoice and packing list; every line is extracted, classified and checked in one pass. |
| Cross-checks the documents | Only if you ask, every time, and only for what you paste. | Quantities, weights, values, parties, origin and incoterms compared across every document automatically, plus arithmetic checks. |
| Audit trail for the ABF | A chat history on someone’s personal account. Auditors do not accept “we asked an AI” as reasonable care. | Every suggestion, reason, alternative, edit, reviewer and timestamp is stored with the documents and exportable for the five-year record period. |
| Consistency across shipments | None. Each chat starts from zero; the same product can get three different codes in a week. | Product memory reuses what your team approved and flags any difference before it reaches the entry. |
| Confidentiality of client documents | Depends on which account and settings staff happen to use. Industry bodies warn against uploading client documents to unrestricted platforms, and some PI policies exclude it. | Company-controlled workspace, roles, logging, encryption, no training on your data, and a published sub-processor list. |
| A review step you can’t skip | Whatever the person reading the chat decides to do. | Operators prepare, reviewers approve, nothing exports as final until a licensed broker signs it off. |
| Fits the team’s day | Copy, paste, copy, paste. | Email the documents in, get the draft back, export the approved lines to your customs system. |
On independent benchmarks, frontier language models answering on their own reach roughly 40% fully-correct classifications at the national 10-digit level and under 60% at 6 digits (ATLAS benchmark, 2025). That is why Tariffly narrows the choice to real tariff items, shows confidence per line, and routes anything uncertain to your broker.
Where it fits next to the tools Australian brokers already use.
They lodge the entry. Tariffly works in front of them: it reads the documents you receive, drafts and checks the lines, and exports them for lodgement. You keep your system and your ICS connection. Integrations.
BorderWise-style libraries are reference books: excellent when you know what to look up. Tariffly reads your invoice first, then does the looking up, and keeps the answer with the shipment.
Some new platforms replace your whole operation at a low per-shipment price. If you are ready to migrate everything, they may suit you. Tariffly adds classification and document checks to whatever you run today, with no migration and no lock-in.
Catalogue-driven classification tools built for large importers and marketplaces cost hundreds of dollars per user per month and rarely cover the Australian tariff. Tariffly is priced per shipment for desks of five to fifty people.
A good broker with a clear description and a tariff library will beat any AI on a single line. What Tariffly changes is everything around that line: the typing, the cross-checking, the forgotten questions, the second product that gets a different code, and the audit file nobody has time to assemble.
Run the free pilot on your last 20 lodged entries and compare Tariffly’s first draft with what you actually lodged. You will see where it helps and where it does not before you pay anything.
Book a 30-minute call. We run three of your shipments through Tariffly with you, live, and you keep the drafts.
Book a pilot call