Rail carriers and freight forwarders use this transaction set to request waybill information and details about shipments moving by rail. A shipper or logistics provider typically sends the request to a railroad or rail operator seeking confirmation of waybill data for a specific shipment or shipments. The transaction opens with the ST segment (Transaction Set Header) and the core request details appear in the ZT segment (Waybill Request Information), which can repeat up to 255 times to handle multiple waybill inquiries in a single transmission. The optional F9 and D9 segments capture the origin and destination station information when needed to narrow down the scope of the request.

For example, a major freight forwarder like Universal Truckload Services might send a Rail Waybill Request to Union Pacific Railroad to retrieve waybill details for a carload of automotive parts shipping from a supplier in Detroit to an assembly plant in Kentucky. The request includes multiple ZT loops—one for each waybill reference number—with F9 and D9 segments specifying the origin station at Detroit and the destination station in Kentucky. Union Pacific receives the 425 transmission and uses the station and waybill identifiers to locate and validate the shipment records before responding with the requested waybill information.