Methodology & data sources

Data

Everything comes from four FMCSA open-data files published on data.transportation.gov: the Motor Carrier Census (az4n-8mr2), SMS BASIC measures for property carriers (4y6x-dmck), Licensing & Insurance filings (c5y8-a4uz) and the SMS crash file (4wxs-vbns). Static pages are rebuilt from a fresh download; the search box queries the same files live. No scraped or third-party data.

National averages

The driver and vehicle out-of-service rates we compare against are computed from the entire SMS file (all inspections ÷ all OOS inspections over the 24-month window), not copied from a blog. Current values: driver 5.42%, vehicle 21.47%, from the 2026-09-13 snapshot covering 716,962 carriers.

The grade

Every carrier starts at 100 points.

• Driver OOS rate (needs ≥ 5 driver inspections): −10 if above the national average, −25 if at least double it.
• Vehicle OOS rate (needs ≥ 5 vehicle inspections): −10 if above the national average, −25 if 1.5× or worse.
• BASIC alerts: −15 per BASIC flagged in the public file (Unsafe Driving, HOS, Driver Fitness, Controlled Substances, Vehicle Maintenance).
• Crashes, 24 months: −20 if fatal crashes reach 0.5 per 100 power units (roughly double the national large-truck rate); otherwise −15 if more than 8 crashes per 100 power units, −5 if more than 4. Crash records don't assign fault.
• Registration and authority: −40 if the USDOT number itself is inactive; otherwise −20 if the carrier has an MC docket that isn't active.
• Liability insurance: shown when a BMC-91/91X filing appears in the open-data extract, but never deducted — that extract covers only a fraction of carriers, so a missing row is not evidence of a lapse. The official record is FMCSA's L&I system.

A = 90+, B = 75–89, C = 60–74, D = 40–59, F = below 40. Carriers with fewer than 5 inspections in total are marked "limited data".

What it is not

It is not an FMCSA safety rating, not a CSA percentile, and not a prediction of a crash. FMCSA's own ratings (Satisfactory / Conditional / Unsatisfactory) come from compliance reviews and are shown on SAFER. Our grade is a transparent summary of the public record so that a carrier can see what others see, and a shipper can get a first read in five seconds. Use SAFER and SMS for the official record.

Corrections

If a page shows the wrong company for a USDOT number or a figure that doesn't match FMCSA's file for the same snapshot date, tell us with the USDOT number and we'll check the source row. Data errors in FMCSA's own record go through DataQs.