The load delivered clean. The POD is signed. The invoice went out with it, Net 30 came and went, and now the broker's phone rings to voicemail. You are not out of options, and you are not at the mercy of a collection agency. Every licensed freight broker in the United States is required by federal law to keep $75,000 on deposit — a surety bond or a trust fund — that exists for exactly one purpose: to pay carriers and shippers the broker did not pay. You can file a claim against it yourself. This is how.
Authority: 49 U.S.C. 13906(b) and 49 CFR 387.307. The current rule took effect January 16, 2026. Everything below is drawn from those texts and from the FMCSA's own guidance; the section numbers are given so you can read them yourself.
When a broker gets its operating authority, the FMCSA will not issue it until the broker files one of two things: a BMC-84 surety bond written by a surety company, or a BMC-85 trust fund agreement held by a financial institution. Either way the amount is $75,000, and the regulation says plainly what it is for: it "shall ensure the financial responsibility of the broker by providing for payments to shippers or motor carriers if the broker fails to carry out its contracts, agreements, or arrangements for the supplying of transportation." — 49 CFR 387.307(a)
Three things follow from that sentence that carriers often get wrong:
A surety adjuster's first question is not "did you haul it" — it is "did you ask to be paid, and can you prove it." Every day you wait to put your demand in writing is a day you cannot get back. Do these in order, and keep the timestamps:
None of this is legally required before a claim. All of it makes the claim faster to approve and harder to contest.
The FMCSA publishes every broker's financial-responsibility filing. Go to the Licensing & Insurance system at li-public.fmcsa.dot.gov, choose Carrier Search, and enter the broker's MC number or USDOT number from your rate confirmation. On the broker's record:
Write down the surety's name, the bond number, and the effective dates. You will need all three on the claim. If the broker's authority has been revoked, that does not end your right to claim — the bond covers the loads brokered while it was in force.
The surety will ask for the documents in the figure above. Put them in one PDF, in that order, every page dated. The claim letter on top should say, in plain sentences: who you are (legal name, MC/USDOT), who the broker is (legal name, MC/USDOT), the bond number and surety name from the L&I record, the load (origin, destination, delivery date, rate confirmation number), the amount owed, the dates you invoiced and demanded, and that you are making a claim against the broker's BMC-84 surety bond (or BMC-85 trust) under 49 U.S.C. 13906. The claim kit linked at the top of this page has a fill-in version. Sureties generally will not open a claim until the invoice is at least 30 days old and unpaid — past the rate confirmation’s terms — and many require two items the figure lists last: the broker-carrier agreement you signed (your carrier packet) and their own proof-of-claim form, signed before a notary.
Claim only what the rate confirmation supports. Line-haul, agreed accessorials, and detention the rate con provides for belong on the claim. Late fees and interest the rate con does not mention generally do not, and including them invites a contest that slows the whole thing down.
This is the point most guides get backwards. The FMCSA does not process bond claims; it registers the bond and enforces the rules around it. Your claim goes to the surety company or the trustee named on the L&I record. Call the surety's main number and ask for the bond claims department (many sureties have a specific email or web form for BMC-84 claims), send the packet by a method that gives you proof of delivery, and note the date. That date starts a clock the regulation defines. On that first call, ask for the surety’s proof-of-claim form and whether it must be notarized — most require it — so it can ride in the packet directly behind the claim letter.
Since January 16, 2026, the regulation sets specific clocks, and they run in your favor:
Read that chain once more from the broker's side. A single paid claim can take its authority away in under three weeks. That is why a written demand that names the bond gets loads paid that a phone call never did.
When a surety determines the broker is experiencing "financial failure or insolvency" — in short, claims are landing that the broker isn't curing — the surety cancels the bond, and the FMCSA publishes that cancellation in the FMCSA Register on its public website. From the date of that publication, the surety must accept claims for 60 calendar days. — 387.307(f)(3)–(4)
Then the statute takes over. Within 30 days after the 60-day window closes, the surety pays either all uncontested claims in full, or — if the claims add up to more than the $75,000 — a pro-rata share to each claimant. — 49 U.S.C. 13906(b)(6)
Two practical consequences. First, file the moment you can — a claim that arrives after the 60-day window is not in the pool. Second, the bond paying you 37 cents does not erase the other 63; the broker still owes it, and the sections below are how you go after it.
The regulation is explicit: a broker filing under Title 11 of the U.S. Code "does not constitute financial failure or insolvency" for these purposes, and the immediate-suspension mechanism does not apply while a bankruptcy proceeding is pending. — 387.307(e)(2), (f)(2) That means the bond-failure process described above may not be triggered by the bankruptcy itself. Your claim against the surety is a claim against a third party's promise to pay, not against the broker's estate — but how the bankruptcy stay interacts with that claim is a question for a lawyer who handles transportation collections, and this is the point to hire one. Do not assume the stay stops you; do not assume it doesn't.
Federal law gives a carrier 18 months from the date the claim accrues to begin a civil action to recover its charges. — 49 U.S.C. 14705(a) The bond process, a collection agency, and a broker's promises to "get you on the next check run" all consume that clock without stopping it. If you are past twelve months on a load with no payment and no bond recovery, the next step is a lawyer or the courthouse, not another email.
Before you accept the load: pull the broker's L&I record. An active BMC-84 or BMC-85 with a real surety, no cancellations in the Insurance History, no pending revocation in the Authority History. Then look at your own book — how many days that broker has actually taken to pay you before. A broker at 55 days with a bond that was replaced twice this year is a broker you price differently, or not at all.
Download the bond claim kit (PDF)
Built inside working truck fleets in the USA — by people who quote loads for a living. RateAnchor is decision support for professional carriers; nothing here is legal, tax, or financial advice. The rules cited change; read the current text at the links above before you act on a deadline.