Fuel Surcharge Index.org is a collaboration between the shipping and trucking community. It allows users to accurately calculate the fuel surcharge rate for a load based on the daily fuel prices along a route. Gone are the days of basing a fuel surcharge rate on a regional or national fuel price average calculated weekly.

With Fuel Surcharge Index, shippers and carriers can get the exact fuel surcharge. Fuel Surcharge Index is an easy to use system that creates fairness and simplifies fuel surcharge calculations. It offers neutrality for shippers and carriers, low-cost of administration, verifiable/auditable data and a direct link to the day and route of a load.


Fuel Surcharge Index = Transparency and Fairness

Instead of using the DOE’s weekly average of national fuel costs, Fuel Surcharge Index.org provides shippers and carriers with accurate fuel prices on over 5,500 truck stops that are updated every 24 hours and specific to the route that a load is actually traveling.

This provides a precise, accurate calculation of the cost of fuel for every load moved. It also lets users see auditable and verifiable fuel costs at the time of shipment – features not available with any other fuel surcharge program today.


DOE = Winners and Losers

Fuel surcharges first became a hot topic in the transportation industry in the mid-1970s, when the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) created the National Retail Average to compensate carriers for the volatile fuel prices of the OPEC oil crisis era. It operates the same way today as it did back then: Each Monday, a representative group approximately 350 retail diesel outlets, including truck stops and service stations report their retail diesel prices, which the DOE uses to issue the national average diesel price for that week.

It became, by default, the baseline for the weekly fuel surcharge rates billed by the carrier. Under this scenario, if fuel prices increase during the week, the shipper wins and the carrier loses. If fuel prices fall during the week, the carrier wins and the shipper is the loser.