A load gets one permanent address, and the address holds and points to the load's information: terms, parties, and tracking. It is not a file on our servers that we hand out. Only a party with the correct lens — its own key — can open it; nobody can look a load up or read its details without the lens, and each lens opens only that party's slice.
This address-and-lens design is what Load Guardrails is built on, and it is coming to live loads. Today the live surface is your account, the directory and network, and the free carrier tools; putting real shipping details into a lens-gated address on a live load is planned at the same honesty bar as the funded-load layer below, not running today.
Addresses are a tree: the business, then its authority, then its loads. A load tendered by a broker sits under that broker's authority. Every party on it has its own address too, seeded from an identifier they already hold.
| Address | What it is | Seeded from |
|---|---|---|
| usdot:1593734C | A carrier with property authority | USDOT number + C; MC kept as a reference |
| usdot:2020202B | A broker (for example, Example Brokerage LLC) | USDOT number + B; $75k bond on file |
| ein:41-0215170 | A shipper with no FMCSA authority | EIN, kept in its own namespace |
| usdot:2020202B/load/000001 | One load, tendered under the broker's authority | The broker's address plus a load number |
FMCSA is moving to USDOT as the single identifier, with authority shown as a letter suffix. Seeding on USDOT now means nothing to re-issue later.
Every transition is checked against a policy that denies by default: only the named party can move the load to the next state. A denied transition is never written. An allowed one is appended to the record, never overwritten.
The funded-load and settlement layer shown below — prefunding, milestone releases, and settlement — is planned as an opt-in capability. It is not live today. The states, ownership, and the shared record are the substrate; the money columns describe how that opt-in layer will move funds once it launches.
Figures illustrate the planned opt-in layer using the example load used throughout this site: a $2,500 carrier rate and a $350 broker margin on a $2,850 shipper cost. Carriers use Load Guardrails free; brokers and shippers pay for the platform's paid capabilities; pricing is published before those capabilities launch.
A carrier's key opens the carrier's slice: rate, equipment, driver. A shipper's key opens cost and status. A broker administering the load sees both sides plus its own margin. A receiver sees its dock window. Nobody administers permissions after the fact; the entitlements are part of the record.
| Reading as | Shipper slice | Carrier slice | Broker slice | Receiver slice | Deed history & settlement |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shipper | yes | — | — | — | yes |
| Carrier | — | yes | — | — | yes |
| Broker | yes | yes | yes | — | yes |
| Receiver | — | — | — | yes | yes |
Today nobody gets paid until four documents reconcile, and each party holds its own version. On Load Guardrails each of them is an entry on the load's address, written by the party that owns that step and read by everyone entitled to it.
createdpicked_up entry, written by the carrierdelivered entry, written by the receiverA manufacturer ships 200 units to a Chicago distribution center. Tuesday 8 AM pickup, Wednesday 6 PM delivery, $1,800 rate. The funding and release steps below illustrate the planned opt-in funded-load layer, which is not live today.
created.funded. Carriers can now be tendered.accepted.picked_up.delivered.settled.No new account number. Your address is seeded from the identifier you already have and nobody else shares.
Your USDOT number with a carrier suffix. Your MC is kept as a reference. Authority must be active, not just present.
Your USDOT plus your authority. Since January 16, 2026, FMCSA suspends broker authority when the $75,000 bond or trust drops below the line and isn't cured in seven days, so what matters is current authority, not that it once existed — the platform checks the current FMCSA record (clearly-labeled sample data until the FMCSA key is connected).
No FMCSA authority needed. Your EIN, in its own namespace, since it's tax-confidential rather than a public registry.
No. Load Guardrails is infrastructure. Any shipper, carrier, or broker can use it directly, and any platform can write a load's address into its own software. It's not a walled garden.
This describes the planned opt-in funded-load layer, which is not live today. In it, the shipper prefunds the full load before pickup and verified milestones release the money. Settlement terms are set when the funded-load capability launches. The money is already there and moves the moment a milestone is confirmed — no 30–90 day wait, no factoring cut.
A load is bound to a specific carrier, truck, and driver at acceptance. Presenting a different truck or identity is a transition the policy denies, so it never gets written. Separately, a carrier whose only authority is broker authority fails the vetting gate before any tender.
Only the parties entitled to. A carrier sees its rate; a shipper sees its cost; a broker administering the load sees both sides. The design goal is that nobody else, including us, can; today Load Guardrails can read what it holds, and section 06 of the Privacy Policy says exactly what that is.
A short, permanent handle seeded from your real identifier. It locates where your data rests; your key turns it back into something readable. The same address works on any machine.
Yes. Any broker, 3PL, or platform that has integrated Load Guardrails can administer your loads — for example, Unbroker, though it is only one broker on the network. And if you and a carrier later want to go direct, that switch is a recorded, consented operation on the load rather than a fight over a non-solicitation clause. The notice, fees, and terms of that switch are the broker's; Load Guardrails takes no position on them.
Loads are written as keyed records, and the goal of the design is that we cannot read what we hold without your key. We're building toward per-party keys before launch; until then, loads run on a shared field we operate. We'd rather say that plainly than claim more than the software does today.
What's live today is ordinary, buildable technology used well: a shared record, keyed access, and an append-only log. The prepaid funded-load and settlement layer is planned as an opt-in capability, not something running today. No magic, no claims a system can't keep. Freight doesn't need magic; it needs one honest record everyone can trust.
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