Letter: MAP-21, Brokering
I am concerned with a particular statement in a letter to the editor titled “Illegal Brokering” written by David Dwinell in the July 29 edition of Transport Topics. Mr. Dwinell makes an inaccurate statement in his article when he states in his bolded section titled, “To all our brokering and brokering agent clients,” that “starting Oct. 1, it is illegal to take a load from another broker or a trucking company.”
MAP-21, last year’s transportation law, establishes regulations forbidding motor carriers from brokering freight (Sec. 32915 (1) (b) (6)) and brokers from providing motor carrier services (Sec. 32916 (d) (1)), but there is no mention within MAP-21 of co-brokering.
Yet co-brokering is a common practice in the freight brokerage industry and often is done under a written co-brokering contract between the two licensed property brokers.
The intent of this language in MAP-21 was to clarify that motor carriers need separate brokerage authority and the subsequent bonding requirement to legally broker freight. Our industry is plagued by fraudulent entities that jeopardize our businesses by illegally double brokering, thus creating huge negligent hiring liability concerns.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has made huge strides in attempting to identify patterns of safety violations and reincarnated carriers, and Congress supplemented FMCSA’s actions by codifying into law these new requirements, to clean up the industry.
Geoff Turner
Chairman, Transportation Intermediaries Association
President and CEO, Choptank Transport Inc.
