PORTLAND, Oregon - TransCore introduces Truckload Rate Exchange program for spot market rates. The Truckload Rate Exchange is a consortium currently comprising truckload intermediaries (freight brokers and 3PLs) that anonymously pool rate data based on actual invoiced spot market transactions to provide an accurate, timely barometer of spot market rates for vans, reefers, and flatbeds across U.S. lanes as well as lanes between the United States and Canada. The result is a database of rates that reflect actual spot market transactions.

“The members of the Truckload Rate Exchange have been delighted with the spot market rate information”

To join the Truckload Rate Exchange, members must meet certain requirements, in exchange for which they receive U.S. and Canadian spot market rates. To avoid compromising proprietary information, members’ identities are kept anonymous and strict privacy policies apply.

The Truckload Rate Exchange is an outgrowth of a program involving hundreds of brokers and 3PLs who have provided actual spot market rates paid by brokers to carriers in order to create the initial spot market rate database. The database is based on $14 billion in aggregated transactions, and is updated daily with current spot market rates. The Truckload Rate Exchange had an early screening at the Transportation Intermediaries Association annual conference earlier this month with roughly 20 percent of the attending companies among the initial contributors to the Exchange program.

“The members of the Truckload Rate Exchange have been delighted with the spot market rate information,” said Don Thornton, TransCore’s senior vice president of Sales, Freight Services. “We have reached a point where we can expand the Rate Exchange program to a limited number of new members, extending comprehensive spot market lane coverage for all equipment types in the United States and Canada.”

TransCore has added the spot market rate data to its Truckload Rate Index which previously featured contract freight lane pricing for 12 million reported line haul rates. With the Exchange, Truckload Rate Index becomes the first and only rating service featuring actual invoiced rates that brokers have paid carriers. This is in contrast to services that use bid rates or factored rates, two systems of measure not based on actual transactions.