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Streamlining Carrier Vetting Without Sacrificing Quality

8 min read

Carrier vetting is a necessary friction in the brokerage business. You need to protect your shipper, your company, and yourself from bad actors and unqualified carriers. But vetting takes time, and time is always short.

The challenge is finding the balance: thorough enough to catch problems, fast enough to book freight.

The Vetting Dilemma

Every broker faces this tension. A carrier calls with a good rate. The load needs to move soon. Do you:

A) Spend 30 minutes doing a complete vetting and risk losing the carrier?
B) Do a quick check and hope for the best?
C) Skip the carrier entirely because you don't have time?

None of these are great options. A is slow, B is risky, and C means missing good carriers.

What Vetting Actually Requires

Let's break down what a thorough carrier vetting process typically includes:

Basic Authority Check

Active operating authority
Correct MC/DOT number
Authority age (newer authorities may be higher risk)

Insurance Verification

Valid liability insurance
Valid cargo insurance
Insurance amounts meet your requirements
Insurance is current (not expired)

Safety Record

Safety rating (if rated)
Inspection history
Out-of-service rates
Crash history

Additional Checks

Double brokering risk indicators
Fraud alerts
Previous performance (if you have history)

Done manually, this can easily take 20-30 minutes per carrier. When you're getting 10 carrier calls on a single load, that's 3-5 hours of vetting work.

The Cost of Slow Vetting

Slow vetting has real costs:

Lost Carriers

Good carriers don't wait. If you take 30 minutes to vet them, they've already booked another load. You lose the rate, they move on.

Time Drain

Hours spent vetting are hours not spent booking, negotiating, or building relationships. It's necessary work, but it doesn't directly generate revenue.

Shortcuts

When vetting takes too long, people cut corners. Maybe they skip the safety check. Maybe they don't verify insurance coverage amounts. These shortcuts create risk.

Streamlining Without Cutting Corners

The goal isn't to vet less. It's to vet smarter. Here's how:

1. Get MC Numbers Upfront

The single most important piece of information for vetting is the MC number. Everything else flows from it. If you capture the MC number when a carrier first calls, you can start vetting immediately.

2. Use Automated Tools

Services like RMIS, Carrier411, Highway, and MyCarrierPackets can automate much of the vetting process. Enter an MC number, get back a compliance report. What used to take 20 minutes takes 2.

3. Create Tiers

Not every carrier needs the same level of vetting:

Pre-approved carriers: Carriers you've used successfully before. Quick verification that nothing has changed.
Standard new carriers: Full vetting process, but streamlined with tools.
High-risk indicators: Extra scrutiny for new authorities, unusual patterns, or fraud flags.

4. Parallel Processing

Don't vet carriers one at a time. When you post a load and carriers start calling, queue up the vetting. While you're on the phone with carrier B, your system is vetting carrier A.

5. Standardize Your Process

A checklist ensures consistency. Everyone on your team vets the same way, every time. No steps get skipped because someone was in a hurry.

The Information Capture Problem

One of the biggest bottlenecks in vetting is getting the right information from carriers in the first place.

A carrier calls. They give you a rate. You ask for their MC number. They give it to you. You start vetting... but they're already gone. Now you have a partial vet on a carrier who may not even call back.

The solution is capturing carrier information systematically at first contact:

MC number
Company name
Contact information
Rate quoted
Equipment type
Availability

When this information is captured automatically (through a system like Fifth Wheel, for example), you can start vetting before you ever speak to the carrier directly.

Building a Pre-Qualified Pool

The fastest vetting is no vetting—or rather, vetting that's already done.

Track the carriers you use. When a carrier performs well, add them to your pre-qualified list. Next time they call, you already know they're good. Quick check that their insurance is current, and you're done.

Over time, this pool grows. More of your carrier calls become quick bookings instead of lengthy vetting exercises.

Red Flags to Never Skip

Some checks should never be shortcut, no matter how rushed you are:

Active authority: Never book a carrier with revoked or inactive authority.
Current insurance: Verify insurance is not expired. Coverage amounts matter too.
Double brokering indicators: Be wary of carriers who seem unfamiliar with basic trucking questions.
Rate too good to be true: Unusually low rates can indicate fraud or desperation.

These checks protect you. Skipping them to save time can cost you much more in the long run.

Technology as an Accelerator

The right technology makes vetting fast without making it sloppy:

Automated compliance checks: Tools that pull authority and insurance data automatically.
Carrier databases: Access to performance history and fraud alerts.
Integration: Systems that connect your intake, vetting, and booking processes.

When a carrier calls and you capture their MC number, the vetting should start automatically. By the time you're ready to book, you should already know if they're qualified.

The Bottom Line

Carrier vetting doesn't have to be a bottleneck. With the right process and tools, you can vet thoroughly and quickly.

The key is capturing information early, automating what can be automated, and building a pool of pre-qualified carriers over time.

Speed and quality aren't opposites. With the right approach, you get both.

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