We will need to know how you apply fuel surcharges. Some carriers are in the practice of periodically publishing their new fuel surcharge and faxing or mailing it to customers. As freight payment service providers, we can tell you from experience that this practice invites the opportunity for things to go wrong.
It is much more efficient to publish a fuel surcharge schedule that is based upon the fluctuating cost of fuel. Our systems accommodate fuel surcharge schedules up to eighteen tiers. They also have an integrated diesel fuel price table that is updated every Monday night from the EIA Diesel Fuel Price Index on the Internet (see link below).
Once we have your fuel surcharge schedule loaded into our system the only thing you have to be concerned about is if the price of fuel exceeds the highest tier in your schedule. If that should happen, just send us an updated schedule.
Questions? Ask Us: Supoort@tldmail.com
If you are going to develop your own fuel surcharge schedule, we recommend you keep it as simple as you can. Simplicity pays off in making your invoices easier to audit--thus easier to pay. We cannot emphasize this enough.
The links below illustrate two. The Middlewest link is an eighteen tier schedule that is typical of many large motor carrier schedules.
The LTL and TL links are screen shots of the FSC maintenance page for our rate engine. These are examples of a simplified approach that a shipper designed with its carriers. All of this shippers LTL carriers use the same LTL schedule and its TL carriers all use the same TL schedule.
LTL Fuel Surcharge Schedule (Pathfinder Rate Engine Screen)
Example of a simplified FSC schedule based on percent of net freight charge
TL Fuel Surcharge Schedule (Pathfinder Rate Engine Screen)
Example of a simplified FSC schedule base on a rate per mile
Middlewest Motor Freight Bureau
MWB Master Tariff Fuel Surcharge Schedule
Using a Factor
(DOE fuel price - carrier provided base fuel price)/Carrier provided MPG factor = cents per mile FSC
Assuming that the DOE National Average Mileage based FSC. *note for shippers work with your TL carriers to try to get them to use the same basis for computing mileage*
Getting Diesel Fuel Prices
The Energy Information Administration Diesel Fuel Price Index is the standard reference used by most carriers for the diesel fuel price used to calculate fuel surcharges. The index is divided into ten geo-economic zones. For simplicity, almost all carriers use the National U.S. Average. We highly recommend this practice.
