The cost per mile in the spot market is 29% higher than a year ago, according to DAT Solutions. The longer-term contract rates that big suppliers negotiate with major carriers usually follow the spot market, which means freight costs should stay high
DAT industry analyst Mark Montague said the top two flatbed lanes in April were intra-Houston and Houston to Midland, Texas. Rates between Houston and Midland were up 30 percent last month.
The continuing rise in tonnage brought a corresponding increase in demand for trucks as evidenced by the 38% jump in activity in DAT Solution’s spot truckload freight availability market in March, said Mark Montague, senior pricing analyst with DAT
There was concern about the electronic device mandate draining truckload capacity out of the market after the enforcement deadline, but DAT Solutions said data doesn’t reflect that.
Despite concerns that the hard ELD enforcement deadline would suck capacity out of the freight market, DAT is not seeing that, according to DAT Trendlines.
“They have to connect with people very quickly and very easily whether they’ve ever worked with them before or will again,” said Kevin Scullin, product manager for load board operator DAT Solutions.
A reduction in truck capacity was a concern for the trucking industry when the electronic logging device mandate soft enforcement period ended April 1, yet capacity has increased 11% on the spot market since then, according to DAT Solutions.
The ratio of loads to trucks on the spot market has been rising steadily for nearly two years, according to Eileen Hart, vice president of marketing and corporate communications for DAT Solutions.
DAT Solutions debuted “DAT OnTime,” a load tracking application for brokers and 3PLs that it called a natural extension to its load board services. It is tailored to intermediaries, who do not have technology on board the trucks themselves.
Mark Montague of DAT Solutions said the statistics on freight rates and loads-to-trucks indicate the April deadline did not cause the same type of spike as the initial Dec. 18 implementation date of the ELD mandate.