Accessorial charges calculator: TONU, layover and more

What accessorial charges are

Accessorial charges are payments for work or time beyond the basic move from pickup to delivery. The linehaul pays for driving the load. Accessorials pay for the waiting, the extra stops, the unloading help, the day lost to a cancelled load. They're easy to forget and easy to lose, because each one depends on terms, times and proof that someone has to collect.

This accessorial charges calculator turns what happened on a load into invoice lines, using your own terms. It doesn't set the rates. The amounts for detention, layover, TONU and the rest come from the rate confirmation or the broker's written terms, and they differ from broker to broker. If a charge isn't in writing before the load, it's a request, not a bill.

The common accessorials, in plain words

• +Detention. Pay for waiting at a shipper or receiver past the free time on the rate con, usually by the hour. Free time is often two hours, but read the rate con.
• +Layover. Pay for a day the truck has to wait because a load couldn't be picked up or delivered as scheduled, usually a flat amount per day.
• +TONU. Truck ordered, not used. A flat payment when a broker cancels a load after the truck was dispatched or arrived.
• +Driver assist. Pay for the driver helping load or unload, sometimes called driver load or unload.
• +Lumper. A fee for a third-party crew that unloads the trailer. The carrier often pays it on the spot and gets reimbursed at cost, with the receipt.
• +Extra stops. Pay for each pickup or delivery stop beyond the first and last.

How the charges are calculated

Detention is the hours at the dock minus the free time, times the hourly rate. If the hours are under the free time, there's no detention. Layover is the number of days times the daily rate. Extra stops are the number of stops times the rate per stop. TONU, driver assist and lumper are flat amounts: whatever was agreed, or for a lumper, whatever you paid. The calculator adds the lines and gives you the total to invoice.

• EXAMPLE

  EXAMPLE LOAD

  Five hours at the receiver, then a layover

  The rate con gives two hours free and $50 an hour after that, with layover at $250 a day. The truck waited five hours, so three hours are billable: $150 in detention. The receiver then pushed the next pickup to the following day, adding one layover day at $250. Total accessorials for the load: $400. These are EXAMPLE terms, not standard amounts.

What is TONU in trucking?

TONU stands for truck ordered, not used. It's a payment to the carrier when a broker or shipper cancels a load after the truck was committed to it, often after the driver has driven empty to the pickup or turned down other freight. It doesn't make the carrier whole for a lost load, but it pays something for the miles and the time.

Whether you get TONU, and how much, depends on the broker's terms and when the cancellation happened. Get the amount on the rate confirmation if you can, and save the cancellation message with the time it arrived. Without that, a TONU claim is hard to win.

Layover pay in trucking

Layover pay covers a day the truck loses because a load can't move as planned, like a receiver that can't unload until tomorrow or a pickup pushed a day. Brokers usually pay layover as a flat daily amount, not by the hour, and many only pay it after a set number of hours or when the delay is the shipper's or receiver's fault.

As with detention, the proof is what gets it paid: in and out times on the bill of lading or in your ELD, a message telling the broker about the delay as it happened, and the broker's agreement to the layover in writing.

Getting accessorials paid

Most unpaid accessorials aren't refused. They were never claimed, or claimed late without proof. Tell the broker as soon as detention starts, keep times on the paperwork, send the claim with the invoice, and follow up. For detention alone, the detention pay calculator goes into more detail on free time and timing.

Our dispatchers file detention, layover and TONU claims for the carriers we dispatch, with the proof attached, as part of the fee. You approve each load first, and the rate con listing those charges comes to you, not to us. See how we work with owner-operators, or check what the fee costs on your week with the dispatcher fee calculator. For how accessorials show up in posted rates, see truckload spot rates.