Hours of Service / Calculating Transit time

Apr '24 (edited) • Freight Broker

I don't think this topic gets enough attention and it's something newbies often overlook which will quickly get you into hot water when you over-promise transit time with that customer you spent all that time and energy acquiring.

There are several more rules to know as a driver, but for brokers the BASIC rules to know for any truck with a GVW > 10,000 lbs are below (basically any truck except a sprinter/cargo van or SMALL box truck);

When a driver starts his clock for the day he has 14 hours to accomplish all duties for the day - this clock doesn't stop or reset until a driver takes 10 hours off. Only 11 hours of this 14 hours can be spent actually driving and there has to be a 30-minute rest within that 11 hours.

Many drivers/dispatchers will try to tell you they will "turn off their ELD" or they're "running paper logs" to try to persuade you to tender the load to them, but they will then likely make up a break-down story as to why they had to stop for 10-hours after they have secured the load. Either that or they are breaking the law which is also not something to support. Sometimes they will actually be a true team or slip-seating drivers at their hub to meet the 45 mph industry standard average, but I always like to make sure I have 2 phone numbers tracking to be sure they aren't lying about this as well.

So in order to calculate transit times for a single/solo driver are as follows;

If driver's deadhead + loaded miles is less than 500 miles, they should be able to make delivery without a 10-hour break under normal conditions, so to get transit time after being loaded, simply divide the loaded miles by 45 and that is how many hours it should take to arrive at delivery.

If driver's deadhead + loaded miles is greater than 500 miles but less than 1000, they will likely need to stop for 1 10-hour break, so divide the loaded miles by 45 and then add 10 to get the hours of transit time needed.

If driver's deadhead + loaded miles is greater than 1000 miles but less than 1500, they will likely need to stop for 2 10-hour breaks, so divide the loaded miles by 45 and then add 20 to get the hours of transit time needed.

If driver's deadhead + loaded miles is greater than 1500 miles but less than 2000, they will likely need to stop for 3 10-hour breaks, so divide the loaded miles by 45 and then add 30 to get the hours of transit time needed. and so on..

Hope this was helpful for some folks.

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