Broker Hasn't Paid in 30 Days: What to Do
The order to work in when a freight invoice goes past due, what each escalation step costs, and which remedies close if you wait too long.
By Movik Editorial ·
If a broker is 30 days past due, work in this order: confirm the invoice actually arrived and was complete, get a pay date in writing, check whether the authority and bond are still active, then escalate. Escalation means a formal demand, a bond claim, and then collections or small claims. Do not wait quietly. Every week spent hoping shortens the window on the remedies that still work.
Is the invoice actually late?
Start here, because it is the answer more often than carriers expect. The payment clock runs from receipt of a complete invoice, not from delivery.
Check three things against the rate confirmation: that you sent the invoice to the billing address it names, that the signed delivery paperwork went with it, and that the amount matches the agreed rate to the cent. A rounded total or a missing signature routes the invoice to manual review, where it can sit for weeks with nobody telling you.
If the invoice came back rather than going quiet, that is a different problem with a faster fix: see why freight invoices get rejected.
If you cannot produce the date and time you sent it, that is the first thing to fix for every load after this one. Without your own send record, the conversation restarts at day zero and you absorb the delay.
What do I do in the first week past due?
Email accounts payable, not the person who booked the load. Ask one question: what is the scheduled payment date, and what is the check or ACH reference.
That phrasing matters. "Any update?" invites a non-answer. A request for a date and a reference either produces both or produces silence, and silence is information.
Keep every reply. A broker who gives you three different dates over three weeks has created the record you will attach to a bond claim.
- Formal demand
A written notice naming the invoice number, the amount owed, the delivery date, and a deadline for payment. It is not a legal filing and you do not need a lawyer to send one. Its job is to convert an informal chase into a dated document that a surety, a collections agency or a court will accept as evidence that you asked.
How do I check whether the broker is still in business?
Look them up in the FMCSA record. The MC number on the rate confirmation resolves to a company, an authority status, and the insurance and surety filings on record.
Three findings change your timeline. An authority that has been revoked means the broker cannot legally arrange freight, and their situation is deteriorating rather than merely slow. A cancelled or expired bond filing means the backstop you were counting on may be gone. And a company name that does not match the one on your rate confirmation is not a payment problem at all, it is double brokering.
$75,000
Minimum surety bond or trust fund a licensed freight broker must maintain
That figure is the whole bond, not your share of it. Every carrier claiming against the same broker draws from the same $75,000, which is why a broker who has stopped paying widely produces claimants who recover cents on the dollar.
When do I file a bond claim?
As soon as a written demand has gone unanswered past its deadline, and sooner if the authority or the bond filing has changed status.
Carriers tend to treat the bond claim as a last resort after collections. That order is backwards. The bond is a fixed pool being drawn down by other claimants, so position in the queue is worth more than politeness, and filing does not stop you pursuing the debt by other means.
You will need the rate confirmation, the signed delivery paperwork, the invoice, your proof it was sent, and the demand. If you have been keeping those per load, this is an afternoon. If you have not, this is why to start.
What does escalation actually cost?
Each step trades money for time or time for money. Run the arithmetic on the actual invoice before choosing.
Take a $2,400 invoice at day 41. A collections agency working on a 30% contingency returns $1,680 if it recovers in full, and nothing if it recovers nothing. Small claims costs a filing fee set by your county rather than a share of the debt, but it costs a day of your time and produces a judgment you may still have to enforce.
| Route | What it costs you | Best case | When it fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Keep chasing | Your time | Full $2,400 | The broker is slow, not failing |
| Bond claim | Paperwork, shared pool | A share of $75,000 | Authority or bond status changed |
| Collections | A contingency share | $1,680 at 30% | Debtor exists and can pay |
| Small claims | Filing fee plus a day | Full amount, minus enforcement | Small debt, local debtor |
The route that is almost never right is waiting a second month with no written date. It costs nothing today and closes options later.
Ask your accountant how to treat an invoice you decide to write off, because the timing of that decision affects your books.
What do carriers get wrong here?
Chasing the dispatcher instead of accounts payable. The person who booked the load does not run the payment cycle and cannot give you a date. Weeks disappear in that inbox.
Taking another load from the same broker to keep the relationship warm. That doubles your exposure to the debtor you already cannot collect from. The relationship is not the asset you think it is if it only runs one way.
Waiting for a round number. Nothing useful unlocks at 60 or 90 days, and several remedies get harder. The trigger is an unanswered written demand, not a date on the calendar.
Never sending anything in writing. Phone calls leave no record. A bond claim, an agency and a court all ask for the same thing, and none of them accept "I called them a lot".
If the gap between delivery and payment is the part that hurts most, the factoring guide sets out what closing it costs.
Frequently asked questions
How long can a broker legally take to pay a freight invoice?
Whatever the rate confirmation and the carrier agreement say. There is no general statutory payment term for domestic truckload freight, so the terms you signed are the terms. If the document is silent on timing, that ambiguity works against you, which is why the payment terms are worth reading before the load rather than after.
Should I keep hauling for a broker who owes me money?
Only with a written pay date and a hard cap on how much more you will let build up. Taking another load from a broker who is already late doubles your exposure to the same debtor for the same reason. If they will not commit to a date, stop.
Does a factoring company chase the payment for me?
Some do and some leave it with you, and the agreement says which. Under a recourse agreement the invoice can be charged back to you regardless of who made the calls. Ask specifically whether collections is included and who speaks to your brokers, because their tone becomes your reputation.
Can I put a lien on the freight if the broker does not pay?
A carrier lien on cargo is a narrow remedy and holding freight to force payment creates its own liability. This is the point to talk to a lawyer rather than to act on a load board thread. Detaining a shipper's goods over a broker's debt is a different dispute from the one you are trying to win.
What happens to the debt if the broker closes and reopens under a new name?
The debt belongs to the entity that signed, and a new entity with new authority does not inherit it. Check whether the new company shares officers or an address with the old one, because that pattern is worth documenting before you accept a load from them.
Movik Editorial
Freight finance desk
The Movik editorial desk covers freight payment, factoring and carrier compliance. Posts are reviewed against the underwriting and document-processing work the team does daily.
Written and fact-checked by the team that underwrites carrier funding applications at Movik.
