Load Tracking Software: What to Test Before You Buy

Load tracking software shows where a truck is and what that means for the load it is hauling: how far from the next stop, whether it will make the appointment, and when it arrived and left. A good system answers a broker's "where is my load?" without a phone call. A weak one gives you a dot on a map and leaves the rest to your dispatcher.

This guide is for owners and dispatchers at asset-based carriers with 5 to 100 trucks. It covers the three layers of tracking, why on-time carriers still lose points on shipper scorecards, what the major vendors say they do, and a worked example of what a tight tracking requirement costs when it is done by hand. Hemut Command is a TMS built for asset-based trucking carriers, and a short section near the end explains where it fits.

What does load tracking software actually do?

Think of it as three layers. If one is missing, the whole thing turns back into phone calls.

Layer 1: position

A device on the truck reports where it is. For most carriers that is a logging device or telematics unit from a provider such as Samsara, Motive, Geotab or Omnitracs. Some carriers also track trailers with their own devices. Position by itself answers "where is the truck," which is a different question from "where is the load."

Layer 2: meaning

The position has to be matched to a load: this truck, this driver, this pickup, this delivery appointment. From that match you can calculate an ETA, see whether the truck is early or late, and record when it arrived at and left each stop. Telematics knows the truck. The TMS knows the load. Tracking software earns its keep by joining them.

Layer 3: sharing

The broker or shipper wants the answer in their format, whether that is a status feed, a portal update, a link, or a third-party visibility platform. Each customer's rules differ, and this is the layer that eats dispatcher hours.

Why do on-time carriers still fail tracking scorecards?

Because a scorecard grades data, not arrivals. A truck can be early and still be marked down if the system has nothing to show the shipper. We see the same few patterns in carrier data over and over.

Missing pings are usually late typing

In a two-week sample of 520 loads for a West Coast carrier, 63% had no tracking ping before pickup. In nearly all of those, the arrival time was typed into the TMS more than two hours after the truck got there (Hemut anonymized carrier data). Do the arithmetic: 63% of 520 is about 328 loads. The record was late, which is not the same as the truck being late. Tuning the ping rule would not have fixed it, because the problem was when someone entered the time.

The location data existed, the load was not ready for it

On another carrier's data, GPS fences supplied only about 11% of pickup arrivals. In a sample of 60 arrivals that dispatchers had entered by hand, the truck was inside the fence for roughly two out of three. So the position was there. The load had not been set up, or the driver had not been assigned, before the truck rolled in, and a visit cannot attach to a load that does not exist yet (Hemut anonymized carrier data). This is why getting loads into the system early matters as much as the tracking device.

Every shipper runs its own regime

One refrigerated carrier was running three tracking regimes for three shippers: a 15-minute EDI feed, twice-a-day portal updates, and a third-party platform. Someone was logging into a portal at 5am. The same carrier was marked down by a large food shipper mostly for missing arrival data rather than late trucks: five of the six "controllable lates" were logged as no arrival time provided (Hemut anonymized carrier data). The workload was the problem, not carelessness.

Phone-based tracking drops out

Tracking tied to a driver's phone fails quietly when an app is closed, a permission is declined or the battery dies. One carrier we work with was being scored by a major shipper on exactly that signal. Data from a unit wired to the truck tends to be steadier, which is one reason the position layer matters.

How often does the truck's position really update?

This trips up buyers who assume the ELD is the tracking feed. Under the federal ELD rule, when the vehicle is moving and there has been no duty status change or other recording in the previous hour, the device adds an intermediate recording that includes location. That works out to a location record about once an hour while driving, as written in 49 CFR 395.26. The same section reduces location precision to about a 10-mile radius for records made during authorized personal use. Those are compliance records, not a live tracking product.

Telematics vendors collect position far more often than that for their own platforms. Samsara's GPS tracking page says its GPS collects location data every second and that geofence notifications can tell you when assets arrive at and leave specific locations. Motive's page says it provides GPS and telematics updates every 1 to 2 seconds. These are the vendors' own statements, so treat them as claims to test on your trucks.

One more gap: not every truck feeds a tracking system. Under 49 CFR 395.8, a carrier may have a driver use paper records instead of an ELD when records of duty status are needed on no more than 8 days in any 30-day period, or when the vehicle was manufactured before model year 2000. If part of your fleet falls in those categories, ask how those trucks show up on the load.

What do telematics vendors and visibility networks cover?

These tools sit at different points in the chain, and they are not substitutes for each other. A fair way to read them is by the layer each one is built for.

Telematics providers (position)

Samsara and Motive are built around the position layer. Samsara describes live GPS data, geofence alerts and a developer API and app marketplace for integrations. Motive says dispatchers can share ETAs with customers and update customers on ETAs. Neither page we read lists prices. Samsara says telematics pricing generally works on a per-vehicle, per-month or annual basis, with free hardware included with most licenses. Ask each vendor for a current quote, and ask what extra fees apply to integrations.

Visibility networks (sharing)

project44 is built around the sharing layer. Its site says it serves shippers, logistics service providers and carriers, and lists three ways for carriers to connect: a mobile app (for drayage and owner-operators), telematics (for asset-based carriers) and API or EDI (for very high volumes). The page we read states no price. Ask the shipper you want to serve which platform it scores from and what it needs from you, because that decides what you have to send.

A TMS (meaning)

The middle layer is the load, and that belongs to your TMS. If the TMS does not know which truck is on which load and when it is due, no amount of position data will produce an ETA on that load. That is the case for judging tracking software together with your TMS rather than as a separate bill. Our pages on trucking TMS software and dispatch software cover that side.

A worked example: what a 15-minute requirement costs by hand

Here is an example with invented inputs. Say a 10-truck fleet hauls for a shipper that wants a status update every 15 minutes while a load is moving, and the fleet has no automated feed. Assume every truck is running a tracked load for 24 hours, which is the worst case, and assume it takes a dispatcher 30 seconds to key and send one update. Both inputs are made up so you can swap in your own.

The result is one full-time person doing nothing but status updates, every day, with no room for a break. Even one truck on that cadence needs 96 updates a day. This is why a person cannot meet that kind of requirement by design, and why carriers who try end up scoring badly on the data rather than on the driving. The fix is a feed that sends position automatically, plus a check that the other side received it.

How Hemut Command handles tracking

Hemut Command reads truck position from Samsara, Motive, Geotab and Omnitracs and uses it to show ETAs and arrival times on loads. For a dispatcher, that moves the answer to "when will it get there" onto the load record, instead of a second app where a tractor number has to be typed in.

Tracking also depends on the load existing before the truck arrives, so Hemut reads rate confirmations (PDFs) and EDI 204 load tenders into loads, so dispatchers do not retype them. Hemut also makes routine check calls to drivers with AI voice agents and records the answers on the load, and Hemut includes playbooks such as "Send a revised ETA the moment it slips" and "Check in on a truck that went quiet". Those are templates a carrier switches on, and we make no promise about results from them.

Two honest caveats. Your telematics provider remains a separate bill. Command costs $99 a month including 3 trucks, then $29 per truck for trucks 4 to 15, so a 10-truck fleet pays $302 a month, and the free trial runs 30 days with no credit card. If a shipper scores you on a status feed, ask every vendor, Hemut included, exactly which status messages it sends and how it proves the partner received them.

A checklist for testing load tracking software this week

1. Pull 20 recent loads and mark how many had a time entered more than two hours after arrival. That is your real data-entry gap.
2. List every customer that scores you on tracking and write down what each one wants: feed, portal, link or platform, and how often.
3. Ask each vendor which position sources it reads, and test it on two of your own trucks, one of them a truck without a logging device.
4. Ask the vendor to show an ETA on a live load that has a delivery appointment, not a dot on a map.
5. Ask what proves a status message was received: a receipt from the partner, not a "sent" flag in your own log.
6. Check that a load can exist before the truck arrives, by uploading a rate confirmation or tender and timing how long it takes to become a load.
7. Get the full price in writing, including hardware, per-truck fees and any integration charges.