Study Shows True Cost and Safety Impacts of Driver Detention

A new American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI) study documents what many of us in trucking already know: that truck drivers unreasonably detained for hours at customer facilities take a hit on their productivity and safety. ATRI has quantified the direct costs for fleets, truck drivers and supply chains in general. 

If you read no further, note the following stark facts about driver detention as shown in data collected for 2023:

• Drivers reported being detained in 39.3% of all stops
• Women drivers had the highest detention rate at 49.1%
• Drivers of refrigerated freight were detained at 56.2% of stops
• Fleets or drivers that operate in the spot market were detained an average of 42.5% of all stops
• Individual drivers were detained on average between 117 and 209 hours last year, depending on the sector 
• In for-hire trucking, the total time lost to truck driver detention exceeded 135 million hours
• While 94.5% of fleets say they charge detention fees, customers pay fewer than half of those invoices
• The trucking industry loses $3.6 billion in direct expenses and $11.5 billion in lost productivity

ATRI’s analyzed its large truck GPS data at different customer facility types and found that detention contributes to higher truck speeds. Trucks that were detained drove 14.6% 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.

As a major fleet CEO said, “Detention is so common that many industry professionals have accepted it as inevitable without realizing the true extent of its costs,” he said. “ATRI’s report puts real-world numbers to the true impact that truck driver detention has on trucking and the broader economy.”

A full copy of the report is available through ATRI’s website here.