How LoadVetting scores carriers

What the score is

Every carrier gets a score from 0 to 100. A higher score means lower risk. The score bands are:

• 60 to 100: lower risk
• 30 to 59: medium risk
• 0 to 29: higher risk

The score is our own signal. It is not an FMCSA safety rating and it is not an SMS percentile.

The data we read

We read public records from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), including its SAFER system and its Licensing & Insurance (L&I) records. A carrier report draws on:

• Federal carrier census and company census records
• Operating authority snapshot (L&I) and operating authority history
• Insurance policies and insurance cancellation history
• BOC-3 process agents
• Inspection history and per-violation records
• Crash records
• BASIC scores from the Safety Measurement System (SMS)
• Out-of-service orders
• The SAFER company snapshot, including the allowed-to-operate flag

How it’s weighted

The score has three parts: Safety 60, Compliance 30, Stability 10.

• Safety (60%): driver and vehicle out-of-service rates against national averages, crash rate per million miles when available, and acute or critical investigation flags in the BASIC data.
• Compliance (30%): how current the carrier’s MCS-150 filing is, BIPD insurance on file, active insurance policies, and recent insurance cancellations.
• Stability (10%): how long the carrier has been operating, active for-hire authority, and census status.

We use rates, not raw event counts, so a large fleet is not punished just for being large.

The dispatch check comes first

Before the score matters, every carrier report runs a dispatch check. It has four results:

• Do not dispatch: SAFER says the carrier is not allowed to operate, there is an active out-of-service order, common and contract authority are both inactive, or a for-hire carrier has no BIPD insurance on file.
• Review before dispatch: a pending authority revocation, records that disagree with each other, or a broker-only authority record where you are vetting a motor carrier.
• Cannot verify: a key source did not answer, or a for-hire carrier has no licensing record or unknown BIPD insurance.
• No dispatch block found: none of the above. This is not an approval.

A good score never overrides a block. A carrier can score well and still show Do not dispatch.

What confidence means

Confidence is about data completeness, not risk. If a source failed, came back empty, or was cut off, confidence goes down. A report with low confidence is not shown as lower risk, even when the score is high.

How fresh it is

Carrier profiles are cached for up to 24 hours. Each time you open a carrier, we recheck authority, out-of-service orders, and the SAFER snapshot.

What we cover

We cover carriers with US DOT authority. That includes Canadian and Mexican carriers that hold active US operating authority.

Corrections

Check authority and insurance with FMCSA before you dispatch. If you spot a data error, tell us the USDOT number.

See it on a real carrier

Open the sample report to see the score, the dispatch check, and confidence on one carrier.