A new report looking at the major consequences that truck driver detention at customer facilities has on industry productivity and safety has been released.
The American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI) research quantifies the direct costs for fleets, truck drivers and supply chains in general. It also corroborates previous research that detained trucks drive faster both after, and before, a detained trip occurs.
Based on industry-reported data, truck drivers were detained between 117 and 209 hours per year, depending on the sector. In for-hire trucking alone, the total time lost to truck driver detention exceeded 135 million hours in 2023.
According to the ATRI, while 94.5 percent of fleets charge detention fees, they are paid for fewer than 50 percent of those invoices. As a result, the trucking industry lost $3.6 billion in direct expenses and $11.5 billion in lost productivity from driver detention in 2023.
Finally, an analysis of ATRI’s large truck GPS data at different customer facility types found that detention contributes to higher truck speeds. Trucks that were detained drove 14.6 percent faster on average than trucks that were not detained. Interestingly, trucks also drove faster on trips to facilities where they were detained, indicating that truck drivers know which firms and facilities will likely detain them.
“Detention is so common that many industry professionals have accepted it as inevitable without realizing the true extent of its costs,” said Chad England, C.R. England CEO.
“ATRI’s report puts real-world numbers to the true impact that truck driver detention has on trucking and the broader economy.”
