What bookkeeping mistakes do trucking companies make?
The most common mistake is not tracking IFTA data correctly. IFTA requires you to report miles driven in each state and fuel purchased in each state every quarter. Many trucking companies track total miles and total fuel but don’t break it down by jurisdiction. When quarterly filing comes due, they scramble to reconstruct the data from ELDs, receipts, and trip logs. This leads to errors, missed deadlines, and penalties that add up quickly.
Related to this is not keeping fuel receipts. IFTA audits can go back four years. If you can’t document your fuel purchases by state, you lose those credits and owe additional tax plus interest.
Not knowing your cost per mile makes it impossible to price jobs profitably. Your cost per mile includes fuel, insurance, maintenance, tires, depreciation, driver pay, permits, and overhead. Many trucking companies just bid on loads based on what the market will bear without knowing if they’re actually making money. They stay busy while losing money on every load.
Equipment depreciation gets handled wrong frequently. Trucks and trailers are major capital expenses. The timing of when you purchase equipment, which depreciation method you use, and whether you elect Section 179 all affect your tax bill significantly. Taking maximum depreciation in a year when you don’t have much income to offset means you’ve wasted deductions you could have used later.
Lumping all revenue together instead of tracking by type is another common problem. Freight revenue, fuel surcharges, accessorial charges, and detention pay should be tracked separately. This tells you what’s actually driving your income and where you have pricing power. If your fuel surcharge isn’t covering your actual fuel cost increases, you need to know that.
Owner-operators and company drivers require different accounting treatment. Owner-operators are 1099 contractors with settlements based on percentage or rate. Company drivers are W-2 employees with payroll taxes. Misclassifying workers is an expensive mistake. And even with proper classification, settlement calculations need to match your contracts and get documented correctly.
Not reconciling broker settlements to your invoices causes hidden problems. Brokers deduct fees, insurance charges, advances, and other items from your gross revenue. If you just record the net deposit, your books don’t reflect true revenue or true expenses. You can’t analyze your costs correctly because some are buried in settlement deductions.
A bookkeeper for small business owners in the trucking industry should understand these specific issues. Generic bookkeeping that works for a retail store doesn’t capture what trucking companies need to track to stay profitable and compliant.
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