PowerQuery syntax

PowerQuery provides advanced search across US import/export Bills of Lading and Mexico import/export customs declarations. Search shipments, companies, suppliers, brokers, and customs records using flexible filters to discover trade relationships, shipment activity, and import/export trends.

How to research US imports

1) I want to find all shipments imported by Walmart
→ Search US Import Companies

2) Explore import activity — related Bills of Lading, overseas suppliers, and shipment history.

How to research US exports

1) I want to research a US exporter
→ Search US Export Companies

2) Explore export activity — export Bills of Lading, shipment history, and trading partners.

Most text fields support the operators below — check each parameter description for “booleans”, “wildcards”, or “ranges”.

Boolean operators

By default, spaces mean OR. A query like capital of Hungary matches documents containing any of those terms.

AND — both terms required: capital AND Hungary
NOT — exclude a term: capital AND NOT Hungary

Grouping

Use parentheses when combining operators:

Shell

(quick OR brown) AND fox

Always parenthesise when you combine operators. Precedence is not what you would guess, so group every clause explicitly rather than relying on it.

Combining operators

((quick AND fox) OR (brown AND fox) OR fox) AND NOT news

Exact phrases

Wrap phrases in double quotes:

Shell

"capital of Hungary"

Wildcards

? — one character
* — zero or more characters

Shell

qu?ck bro*

Limits: at most one * and three ? per field — exceeding either returns 400 with “must contain no more than 1 (*) wildcard and no more than 3 (?) wildcards”. See core concepts.

Ranges (numeric fields)

Inclusive ranges use square brackets; exclusive use curly braces. Open ends use *. Put the range syntax in the field's query parameter value.

Shell

# 1 to 5
company_total_shipments=[1 TO 5]

# 10 or more
company_total_shipments=[10 TO *]

# up to 500
supplier_total_shipments=[* TO 500]

Datasets & common routes

US import documents — /powerquery/us-import/bols
US export documents — /powerquery/us-export/bols
Mexico import declarations — /powerquery/mx-import/declarations
Mexico export declarations — /powerquery/mx-export/declarations

Aggregation routes (companies, suppliers, brokers) share the same filter style and return ranked lists instead of raw documents.

Allowed values

Some US import filters only match a name that is already stored on the shipments. Ask for one list at a time. The call is free, and the biggest counts come first.

List	Use the value in
`countries`	`supplier_country`
`entry_ports`	`entry_port`
`shipping_ports`	`exit_port`
`bill_types`	`bol_type`
`carriers`	`carrier_scac_code`
`ssl_or_ff`	Not a filter — the `ssl_or_ff` field on each shipment
`quantity_units`	Not a filter — the `quantity_unit` field on each shipment

Get a value list — for example /v1.0/values/shipping_ports lists the names exit_port accepts.

Add search to find one spelling. It is not case sensitive, so /v1.0/values/countries?search=korea returns both South Korea and Republic Of Korea. Lists page like other routes: 10 names by default, and data.totalCount says how many match.

Dates & pagination

Use mm/dd/yyyy. Defaults start at 01/01/2021 and end on the last day of the previous month. Paginate with page_size, offset, or page.

Walk through a real search in Search shipments with PowerQuery.