The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has recently launched an information-gathering campaign intended to educate the agency regarding the operations of interstate property brokers. These inquiries generally focus on compliance with federal property broker regulations under 49 C.F.R. Part 371, including recordkeeping requirements. Companies holding broker authority should be familiar with those requirements and ensure their documentation is complete and accessible.

What Investigators Are Requesting

FMCSA investigators typically ask for records related to loads brokered within the preceding 12 months. These records must be maintained in accordance with Subpart A of Part 371, which contains the following key requirements:

• Transaction Records: Brokers must retain documentation for each load, including shipper and carrier names, compensation received by the broker, freight charges collected and paid to the carrier, and any other financial records.
• Retention Period: Records must be preserved for three years from the date of the transaction.
• Transparency: Under the current regulation, each party to the brokered transaction has a right to review the records required to be kept under the regulation.

FMCSA investigators may also inquire about the broker’s billing, carrier selection, and onboarding practices. One area where investigators appear to be a bit confused has to do with household goods regulation.  Brokers that arrange for regulated household goods transportation are subject to additional detailed consumer protection-type regulations that do not apply to brokers of general commodities.  Nevertheless, FMCSA has been posing questions to general commodity brokers derived from the household goods regulations.  If faced with such questions, a general freight broker should clarify that it is not a household goods broker and is not subject to the additional requirements applicable to such operations.

Possible Outcomes of Compliance Review

 FMCSA reportedly does not intend to identify violations and issue fines. Rather, the agency purports to be educating itself on brokerage operations generally after decades of essentially ignoring broker oversight.  That said, failure to comply with this informational-gathering process can result in enforcement actions, including fines.

Status of Proposed Rulemaking on Broker Transparency

In late 2024, FMCSA proposed rule changes to modernize broker transparency obligations—requiring electronic records, expanding what must be captured, and imposing a 48‑hour timeline to provide records upon request and, most importantly, clarifying that failure to provide records would constitute a violation even if the requesting party had contractually waived its right to access the records. The comment period was reopened in February 2025, and, according to the FMCSA’s regulatory agenda published this past September, the FMCSA has scheduled a second notice of proposed rulemaking on broker transparency for May 2026.  This is a unique step and one that may signal that the agency is considering a different tactic than what was laid out in the original notice.

Preparing for a Broker Compliance Review

FMCSA’s increased focus on broker transparency underscores the importance of meticulous documentation, though the Firm expects the vast majority of brokers to maintain required records electronically. For brokers concerned the FMCSA may come calling, the Firm recommends the following:

• Audit your transaction records for the past 12 months.
• Verify that all required information under 49 CFR 371.3 is included.
• Prepare a master list of shippers/consignors and carriers.
• Implement a compliance checklist to maintain ongoing adherence.