Industries · trucking

Trucking bookkeeping built around the mile.

Monthly bookkeeping: $550–$1,800/mo

IFTA tracked all quarter, cost per mile readable on demand, settlements and factoring booked so what you netted is what the books show. Bookkeeping for carriers and owner-operators that's built around how a trucking business actually makes — and loses — money.

IFTA-ready records · cost per mile · settlements & factoring. Fixed-fee, CPA-ready. We're not a CPA firm.

IFTA tracked as you go Cost per mile on demand

Reviewed before delivery: a documented check proves the accounts against their statements and puts open items in writing. How it works.

Quick answer

Trucking bookkeeping is organized around cost per mile, with miles and fuel purchases captured by state all quarter so the IFTA return is built on records already reconciled. If a fleet runs more than one truck, each truck gets its own profit line, with shared costs such as insurance split on a stated basis.

Included in monthly bookkeeping ($550–$1,800 a month); your exact fee is scoped in writing. Trucks, fuel cards and settlement statements to tie out set where a carrier lands. What the ranges cover.

The reality of carrier books

Where trucking books are won or lost.

A trucking business can run hard all year and still not know whether it's making money, because the costs that matter — fuel, maintenance, the truck payment, insurance, driver pay — are spread across the operation and only mean something when you divide them by the miles. The job of the books is to turn all that motion into a single honest number: what it costs you to run a mile, against what a load pays for one.

Layered on top is compliance that sits outside a typical small business's books. IFTA wants miles and fuel reconciled by state every quarter. Settlements net advances, insurance, and escrow out of gross pay. Factoring trades your invoices for fast cash at a fee that has to show up as a real cost. Miss any of it and the books drift fast.

We keep these as the operating realities they are — reconciled monthly, closed on a fixed date, and reported so you can read the truth without an accounting degree.

IFTA, tracked all quarter

Fuel receipts coded by state and mileage kept current, so the quarterly return reconciles instead of being reconstructed under deadline.

Cost per mile, on demand

The chart of accounts built so fuel, maintenance, pay, and fixed costs divide cleanly against miles — the number that decides which loads are worth it.

Settlements & factoring, booked straight

Deductions netted to the right accounts and factoring fees shown as the cost they are — so what you netted is what the books say.

Worked example · three trucks

A per-truck P&L, with shared costs split on a stated basis.

Direct costs are coded to a truck as they're entered. Costs no single truck owns are split by miles, and the split is written down so it's the same every month.

Illustrative example — not client data. Assumptions stated.

Illustrative per-truck profit and loss for one month, shared costs split on a stated basis
One month	Truck 1	Truck 2	Truck 3	Fleet
Miles run	10,200	9,400	8,100	27,700
Load revenue	$24,600	$21,300	$17,850	$63,750
Fuel	$6,630	$6,110	$5,670	$18,410
Driver pay	$6,120	$5,640	$4,860	$16,620
Maintenance and tires	$1,180	$2,940	$640	$4,760
Truck payment or lease	$2,150	$2,150	$1,480	$5,780
Shared costs, split at $0.25 a mile	$2,550	$2,350	$2,025	$6,925
Truck profit	$5,970	$2,110	$3,175	$11,255
Cost per mile, all costs	$1.83	$2.04	$1.81	$1.90
Revenue per mile	$2.41	$2.27	$2.20	$2.30

The allocation basis: $6,925 of costs no single truck owns (insurance, ELD and dispatch subscriptions, admin overhead) divided by 27,700 fleet miles is $0.25 a mile, so each truck carries $0.25 for every mile it ran. What it shows: the fleet made $11,255, but Truck 2 made $2,110 of it because a $2,940 repair landed in its month. A blended fleet P&L would show a decent month and hide which truck carried the cost.

Assumptions:

A three-truck fleet with company drivers paid by the mile; the numbers are invented.
Fuel-card lines and repair bills carry the unit number, so each is coded to a truck class as it's entered.
Shared costs are split by miles because insurance and dispatch scale with use. Equal shares or revenue also work, as long as the basis is stated and kept.
Depreciation and owner pay are left out of this month's view.

What carriers come to us for

The work behind clean trucking books.

Monthly bookkeeping

IFTA records, settlements, and cost per mile kept current and reconciled every month.

Monthly bookkeeping

Behind on the books?

A quarter (or a year) of settlements and fuel never reconciled — caught up to a clean baseline.

Bookkeeping cleanup

Financial statements

Cost per mile and real margins in owner-readable, CPA-ready statements every month.

Financial statements

We serve businesses across the US remotely, Texas-first, carriers included. We keep the books; IFTA filing and tax stay coordinated with you and your CPA.

FAQ · Updated October 2026

Carriers and owner-operators ask us these.

What makes trucking bookkeeping different from regular bookkeeping?

The cost structure and the compliance load. A carrier's money runs through fuel, maintenance, insurance, truck payments, and driver pay — and the number that decides whether a load was worth running is cost per mile, not a year-end P&L. On top of that sits IFTA fuel-tax reporting, settlements that net a dozen deductions, and, for carriers that factor, a fee taken out of every invoice. Generic bookkeeping treats a truck like an ordinary expense line and misses all of it; trucking books have to be built around the mile.

How do you handle IFTA fuel-tax tracking?

IFTA (the International Fuel Tax Agreement) requires a quarterly return that reconciles the miles you ran in each state against the fuel you bought in each state, so the tax lands where the driving happened. That only works if two things are tracked all quarter: miles by jurisdiction and fuel purchases by jurisdiction. We keep the books so those numbers are captured and reconciled as you go — fuel receipts coded by state, mileage records kept current — instead of scrambling them together the week the return is due. The filing itself and any audit response stay coordinated with you and your CPA; we keep the underlying records clean and ready.

How do you track per-mile and per-load profitability?

By building the chart of accounts so cost per mile falls out of the books rather than being guessed. Fuel, maintenance, tires, insurance, the truck payment, and driver pay are tracked as the operating costs they are, divided against the miles run, so you can see your real cost per mile — and compare it to the revenue a load pays. That's the number that tells you which lanes and which loads actually make money, and it's invisible on books kept the generic way.

Can you handle owner-operator settlements and factoring?

Yes — both are places where trucking books go wrong, because each nets several items into one number. A settlement nets gross pay against fuel advances, insurance, escrow, and other deductions, and each piece has to hit the right account or the books stop reflecting reality. Factoring — selling your invoices for immediate cash at a fee — has to be recorded so the fee is visible as a cost and the receivable is cleared correctly, not double-counted as income. We book settlements and factored invoices so what you actually netted is what the books show.

Owner-operator, a small fleet, or a company driver — does it matter?

It changes the books meaningfully. An owner-operator's truck, insurance, and per-diem picture is different from a fleet running several trucks and drivers with payroll and equipment depreciation, which is different again from a driver paid by a carrier. We set the books up for the structure you actually run, so the reports answer your questions — not a template's.

Know your cost per mile

Get trucking books that tell you the truth.

We review how your carrier's books are kept and scope a fixed monthly fee to run them right — IFTA-ready, settlements straight, cost per mile on demand. Nothing is owed for the review.

Free books review Request a call

IFTA records kept ready Cost per mile on demand Fixed fee, in writing