Detention Billed but Not Paid: Why the Broker Says No, and What Gets It Paid

The evidence that wins a detention claim

A detention claim succeeds when the broker can pass it to its own customer without doing any work. That means four pieces, attached to the invoice, every time.

• Timestamps from the truck. The ELD records the time and location of each duty-status change, and telematics platforms can add geofence arrival and departure at a facility. Export the record for the stop, not a screenshot of a phone.
• In and out times on the BOL. A receiver’s signature next to written arrival and departure times is the document the shipper side already trusts. Make writing the times on the BOL part of the driver’s routine at every stop, not only the slow ones.
• The rate con’s detention clause. Quote the rate, the free time, when the clock starts, any notice requirement and any cap. Billing against the agreed terms in the broker’s own words leaves little to argue about.
• Prompt, written notice. An email, portal message or load-tracking update when the truck checks in and again when free time ends, with the time stamped by the system that sent it. A phone call nobody wrote down is hard to prove later.

None of this needs new software. It needs the times captured at the stop and stored on the load, so that whoever bills the load days later is not reconstructing the wait from memory.

How to get detention pay from a broker, step by step

The steps below run from the moment the load is booked to the moment the claim is closed. Each one leaves a record the next step depends on.

• Before the load: read the detention clause on the rate con and put three things on the load record — free time, how the clock starts, and the notice requirement. If the rate con says nothing about detention, ask for terms in writing before accepting.
• At the dock: notify the broker in writing at check-in and again when free time expires, and ask for an acknowledgment. Keep both messages with the load.
• At delivery: get in and out times on the BOL, then pull the ELD or geofence record for the stop the same day.
• Billing: put detention on the same invoice as the line haul whenever the terms allow it, with the evidence attached. If the load is factored, submit the detention through the factor the way the agreement requires, so the accessorial is not left outside the purchase.
• Follow-up: when the payment arrives, check it line by line. A missing or reduced detention line is a short-pay, and it gets a written dispute with the evidence attached again, not a post to paid.
• Escalation: if the dispute goes unanswered, a second written request to the broker’s carrier-relations or accounts-payable desk, then a final written notice that states the amount, the load and the clause it rests on.
• Close-out: record the outcome on the load — paid in full, paid in part with the stated reason, or denied with the stated reason. The reasons are what fix the next rate con.

Make detention someone’s job

Detention falls between seats. The dispatcher knows the truck waited, the driver has the times, and billing works from paperwork days later. If nobody owns the detention claim from the dock to the deposit, it ends up owned by whoever has a spare minute, which is nobody.

The fix is a name and a list, not a hire. One person already on staff owns every open detention claim: one list, one row per claim, with the load, the broker, the hours, the amount, the date billed, and the next action with its date. The list gets read once a week, in the same meeting, by name.

Three numbers make the list useful: detention recorded on the ELD, detention billed, and detention collected. The gap between the first two is a capture problem inside the fleet. The gap between the last two is a collection problem with specific brokers, and it is the basis for the next conversation with them — a firmer clause, a higher rate on that lane, or a decision to stop hauling for a broker that does not pay what it agreed to.

Illustrative example: a fleet records 40 hours past free time in a month, bills 25 of them, and collects on 10. The 15 hours never billed are a fix inside the building. The 15 billed and unpaid hours belong to perhaps three brokers, and those three conversations are worth more than any new tool.

The broker’s records: 49 CFR 371.3 and the transparency proposal

When a carrier suspects that the shipper paid detention to the broker and the broker did not pass it through, there is a federal records rule on point. Under 49 CFR 371.3, a broker must keep a record of each brokered transaction for three years. The record shows, among other things, the compensation the broker received and the name of the payer, the freight charges it collected and the date of payment to the carrier. Paragraph (c) gives each party to a brokered transaction the right to review that record.

The right has limits in practice. In its proposed rule published November 20, 2024 (89 FR 91648), the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration noted that contracts between brokers and motor carriers frequently contain waivers of this right. The proposal would require brokers to keep records electronically, to itemize all charges and payments for each shipment, and to provide the records within 48 hours of a request from a party to the transaction. It did not include the petitioners’ requested ban on waiver clauses. FMCSA reopened comments on February 18, 2025 (90 FR 9702), and that period closed March 20, 2025.

The status as of October 17, 2026: the proposal is not a final rule. The federal regulatory agenda lists a supplemental proposal for this rulemaking, and trade press reported in late August 2026 that it had gone to the White House for review; no new text has been published in the Federal Register. Until something final is published, 49 CFR 371.3 as written today is the rule.

Before asking for records, check the broker-carrier agreement for a waiver of the review right, and treat the request as a business step taken with counsel rather than a first move.

Is there a law that requires detention pay for truckers?

No federal statute or FMCSA regulation requires a shipper, receiver or broker to pay a carrier for detention, and none sets a rate or a free-time limit. Detention is owed when the rate confirmation or the broker-carrier agreement says it is. The Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General treated it as a contract matter in its 2018 report: contracts between shippers, receivers and motor carriers may set limits on loading and unloading time and may entitle carriers to fees for time past them, and not all shipping contracts include detention pay clauses. A December 2025 Congressional Research Service report describes it the same way: the wait can be specified in a contract between carrier and shipper and may include a compensation rate. In a February 2024 notice (89 FR 12413), FMCSA wrote that there is currently no standard definition of detention time.

The federal rules that do touch detention deal with safety, not payment. Under 49 CFR 390.6, a shipper, receiver or transportation intermediary may not coerce a driver to operate in violation of the federal safety rules, which include the hours-of-service limits, and a driver who believes that happened can file a written complaint with FMCSA. In September 2025, FMCSA proposed a pilot program (90 FR 44872) that would let participating drivers pause the 14-hour driving window once, for 30 minutes to 3 hours, and the pause can include waiting time at a pick-up or delivery. On October 6, 2026, FMCSA published a notice seeking comment on the data collection for that pilot (91 FR 63640). The pilot changes the clock, not who pays.

So the detention clause on the rate con is the rule for that load, and there is no federal default to fall back on when the rate con is silent. How a fleet pays its own drivers for waiting time is a separate question, governed by wage-and-hour law and the driver or lease agreement. Not legal advice.

When a detention claim is not worth chasing

Not every unpaid detention line deserves an afternoon. Chasing one costs a person’s time, and some claims cost more than they can return.

• The amount is smaller than the time it takes to collect, and the broker is a good payer on everything else. Note it, raise it at the next rate negotiation, and move on.
• There is no proof and no notice on record. A claim built on memory is hard to win in a dispute, and pressing it can cost goodwill on a lane worth keeping. Fix the capture for next time instead.
• The rate con excluded detention or capped it, and the carrier accepted those terms. The leverage is in the next rate con, not in this invoice.
• The broker has stopped paying altogether. That is no longer a detention claim; it is a nonpayment problem. Under 49 CFR 387.307 a broker must carry a $75,000 surety bond or trust fund, which provides for payments to motor carriers if the broker fails to carry out its contracts. That is one total amount, not a fund per claim, so speed and documentation matter.

If the full list is long and nobody has time to sort it, start smaller: the free Revenue Self‑Audit scores each hand-off between delivery and cash in a few minutes. The Revenue Review is a read-only engagement that counts detention recorded, billed and collected from the fleet’s own ELD, TMS and accounting records. It is not worth it for a fleet that already reads a weekly detention list and closes every claim with a reason — that fleet has already done the work. A free 20-minute call is enough to tell which one applies.