Dispatcher vs Freight Broker: Who Needs the $75K Bond?

Yes, if each relationship is a separate written agency agreement and the dispatcher never allocates a single load between two carriers at its own discretion. FMCSA's June 2023 guidance (88 FR 39368) is explicit that a bona fide agent "can represent multiple motor carriers," but the moment the dispatcher decides which of those carriers gets a given load — rather than the carrier deciding for itself — the agent is allocating traffic and functions as a broker under 49 CFR § 371.2.

Payment source is one of the strongest signals FMCSA weighs, but it isn't the only one. Being paid solely by the carrier — never by a broker, factoring company, or shipper — supports bona fide agent status. It won't save you, though, if you're also negotiating rates directly with shippers or deciding which carrier in your book gets which load. FMCSA reviews the full fact pattern, not one factor in isolation.

It depends on who's making the placement decision. Pulling loads off a board and presenting them to the one carrier you're under written contract with is dispatch work. Accepting a load first — before a specific carrier is lined up — and then finding whichever carrier will take it is functioning as an intermediary between shipper and carrier, which is exactly what 49 U.S.C. § 13102(2) defines as broker activity, regardless of what you call the business.

Two separate penalty tracks apply. Under 49 U.S.C. § 14916 ("Unlawful Brokerage Activities"), civil penalties run up to $10,000 per violation and you become personally liable to any carrier or shipper with a valid claim, with liability extending jointly and severally to the business and to its individual officers, directors, and principals. Separately, 49 CFR Part 386, Appendix B, item (g)(2) sets a civil penalty of up to $13,676 per violation for operating as a broker without complying with the registration requirements of 49 U.S.C. § 13904 or the financial-security requirements of § 13906 — the exact requirement the BMC-84 bond satisfies. (That $13,676 figure is the general property-broker penalty; a separate, much higher $39,615 minimum in the same appendix applies only to unregistered household-goods brokers, not freight dispatch services.) Neither track requires proof of intent to defraud — operating without the required broker registration and bond is enough.

Yes. Broker authority is separate from carrier authority and gets its own MC number issued through FMCSA Motus registration system. You'll also need the $75,000 BMC-84 bond (or a BMC-85 trust) and a BOC-3 process agent filing before your authority shows ACTIVE. Our step-by-step walkthrough covers the full sequence.

No — there's no reduced-amount bond for partial or informal brokering. The $75,000 BMC-84 amount at 49 CFR § 387.307 is fixed regardless of how small the operation is or how few loads it books. If your activities cross into broker territory under the factor test, the requirement is the same $75,000 bond that applies to a national brokerage moving thousands of loads a month.