The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s listening session on brokered freight transactions this past Wednesday, October 28, shone light from multiple viewpoints on regulation that today exists and that some feel is being circumvented by brokers to owner-operators', shippers' and the public's detriment. Others -- brokers, principally -- voice the view that the reg has outlived its usefulness and applicability in today's freight market.

In this edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast, track back through the entire session, with quite a lot of commentary from the broker side of the equation at the top, but with truckers further weighing in in roughly equivalent numbers as the session wears on.

At issue specifically: three petitions, two to beef up the regulation requiring disclosure of all freight charges on both sides of a brokered transaction, another to remove the reg entirely. 49 Code of Federal Regulations 371.3(c) is the part of the broker regulations at principal issue – it enshrines that all parties to a brokered transaction have a right to review the record. Find more reporting on the subject via http://OverdriveOnline.com/tag/brokers and the origin story of this most recent attention to the issue after this year's Mayday protests in the depths of the freight downturn via this link to a past podcast: https://www.overdriveonline.com/eld-mandate-protestor-provider-discuss-brokers/