Owner-Operator Guides

Getting started Carrier Packet for Box Truck Owner-Operators The documents a broker checks before your first load, where each one comes from, and the mismatches that get a packet sent back. Read → Contracts How to Read a Box Truck Owner-Operator Offer Ten questions to put in writing before you sign, and how a lease onto someone else's authority changes the rules. Read → Contracts How to Get Box Truck Contracts: 5 Ways Owner-Operators Find Paying Work Five ways owner-operators find paying work for a box truck: load boards, direct customers, brokers, dedicated programs, carrier partners. Read → Pay What Box Truck Owner-Operators Actually Earn What a box truck owner-operator actually takes home once fuel, insurance, maintenance and empty miles come out of the gross. Read → Licensing Do You Need a CDL for a Box Truck? The 26,001 lb line decides it, not the length of the box - and what you still need even when no CDL is required. Read → Getting started Box Truck Owner-Operator Requirements: What You Need to Start Truck, licence, authority, insurance and the paperwork order that gets you to the first load - and what the 26,001 lb line changes. Read → Costs and insurance Box Truck Insurance: What You Need and What Moves the Price The $750,000 federal floor, why cargo coverage is a contract requirement rather than a legal one, and the inputs that decide your premium. Read → Costs and insurance Box Truck Cost Per Mile: What It Really Costs to Run How to work out your own cost per mile on total miles, which costs are fixed, which compliance items people leave out, and the rate floor… Read → Finding freight Box Truck Load Boards: Where the Freight Actually Is What a load board is for, how the three types differ for a straight truck, and the checks that stop a booked load falling apart at… Read → Finding freight Amazon Relay and Dedicated Work: Worth It for a Box Truck? What a dedicated commitment actually buys, what it costs in flexibility, and the week-long arithmetic that answers it before you apply. Read → Direct Shippers Finding Direct Shippers for a Box Truck Who ships on straight trucks, how to find them, and what a shipper asks for that a broker does not. Read → Maintenance Box Truck Maintenance: What It Costs and What the Law Requires What the maintenance rules actually require, what a year on a box truck costs, and how to price it per mile instead of per repair. Read → Taxes Box Truck Taxes: What Owner-Operators Can Actually Deduct Which taxes arrive with the truck, what comes off the top, and what the deductions depend on you having written down. Read → Scaling up Scaling From One Box Truck to Two: What Actually Changes Why the second truck is a compliance decision before it is a money one, and the four tests that say the first one is ready. Read → Pay Freight Factoring vs Weekly Pay When factoring still makes sense if your carrier already pays weekly, and the clauses that decide what it costs. Read → Pay Detention Pay: How to Document the Wait What to get on the rate confirmation, what to record at the dock, and how to file a detention claim that is hard to deny. Read → Pay POD and Bill of Lading: The Paperwork That Gets a Load Paid What to check on the bill of lading at pickup, what makes a proof of delivery clean, and how to send it so the invoice gets… Read → Contracts Rate Confirmation: What to Check Before You Sign A five minute check for every load: who the rate con is from, what it pays, the stops and freight, the payment terms and the penalties. Read → Pay TONU: When a Cancelled Load Should Still Pay You When truck order not used should pay you, what the TONU term on your rate con must say, and what to record when a load falls… Read → Licensing ELD and Hours of Service for a Box Truck Under 26,001 Pounds Which hours of service rules reach a box truck under your own MC, how the short-haul exceptions work, and when paper logs or an ELD are… Read → Licensing Keeping Your Box Truck Authority Active: UCR, MCS-150 and BOC-3 How the yearly UCR fee, the MCS-150 update every 24 months and the BOC-3 work for a box truck owner-operator under their own MC, and when… Read →