TONU (Truck Ordered Not Used): What It Is and What to Pay

Updated 2026-08-10

TONU — truck ordered not used — is the fee a carrier charges when a load is cancelled after the truck has been dispatched to it, compensating for the empty miles and the hours the carrier can no longer sell.

There is no standard TONU amount, and pages that give you one are guessing

TONU is not a regulated charge. No federal rule sets it, no public dataset tracks it, and no rate index publishes it. It exists only as a term in a rate confirmation or a broker–carrier agreement.

Industry publishers do report ranges — FreightCenter, for example, describes roughly $150 to $300 for standard van equipment, higher for specialized (checked 2026-08-10). Treat those as observations from people who sell freight services, not as a benchmark. They are typically not sourced to any survey, and none of them know your lane, your deadhead, or what the truck gave up.

The number you can actually defend to a carrier is built, not looked up.

Build a TONU from the carrier’s real loss

Two things happen when a dispatched load cancels: the truck burns empty miles, and it loses hours from a day that has a hard federal limit.

The empty miles. ATRI puts the industry-average cost to operate a truck at $2.336 per mile in 2025, and $1.854 per mile excluding fuel (ATRI, July 2026). A truck that ran 60 miles to a cancelled pickup usually has to run somewhere to get its next load, so the honest figure is closer to a round trip than a one-way.

Deadhead to the cancelled pickup	Empty-mile cost, one way	Empty-mile cost, in and back out
25 miles	$58	$117
50 miles	$117	$234
100 miles	$234	$467
150 miles	$350	$701

Our calculation, not a survey: miles × ATRI’s $2.336 per mile (2025), rounded to the dollar. Substitute your own cost per mile if you have it. See methodology.

The hours. Under 49 CFR 395.3, a driver “may not drive after a period of 14 consecutive hours after coming on-duty,” with a limit of 11 driving hours inside that window. Hours spent approaching a load that evaporates come out of that window and cannot be recovered later in the day. If the cancellation kills the driver’s ability to pick up anything else before the clock runs out, the real loss is a day of capacity, not a tank of fuel.

A workable formula:

TONU = (empty miles in + empty miles out) × your cost per mile
     + (hours consumed × your hourly opportunity cost)
     + any documented out-of-pocket (tolls, scale, permits, ordered-and-bought supplies)

That is a number a carrier’s dispatcher can check, which is what makes it survive the phone call. A flat $150 offered against a 120-mile deadhead does not.

When TONU is and isn’t owed

The dispute is almost never about the amount. It is about whether the trigger fired.

Situation	Typically owed?	Why
Cancelled after dispatch, before the truck arrives	Yes, if the rate con says so	The carrier committed capacity and moved
Cancelled while the truck is at the shipper	Yes, and often at a higher tier	Empty miles plus dock time; some contracts convert to detention after free time
Freight not ready, truck sent away, reloaded next day	Usually layover, not TONU	The load still moves; different clause
Truck arrives with the wrong equipment	No	The carrier failed the tender
Carrier cancels	No	Not a broker-caused cancellation
Cancelled before dispatch	No	Nothing was consumed — this is why “dispatched” needs a definition

That last row is the one that generates arguments. Define “dispatched” in the contract: driver assigned and en route, confirmed by a dispatch record or a tracking ping. Without a definition, both sides pick the definition that pays them.

Clause language

TONU (TRUCK ORDERED NOT USED)
Trigger: broker or shipper cancels this load after the carrier has dispatched a
  driver, defined as a named driver assigned and en route to the pickup, evidenced
  by dispatch record or tracking ping.
Amount: $[###] flat, plus deadhead beyond [##] miles reimbursed at $[#.##] per
  mile in each direction, plus documented out-of-pocket costs with receipts.
If the truck has already arrived at the pickup, [detention] terms apply from
  arrival and TONU is payable in addition.
Not payable if: the carrier arrives with non-conforming equipment, arrives outside
  the appointment window, or cancels for its own reasons.
Claim window: [15] days from the cancellation date, with dispatch evidence.

What this costs brokers who do not price it

A TONU is a cost you already incurred by the time you negotiate it. The lever is upstream: cancellations mostly come from freight that was never firm, appointment times that were never confirmed, or quote replies so slow that the customer covered the load elsewhere and forgot to tell you. Every hour between a quote request and your reply is an hour in which the load can be double-covered — which is the same failure mode that produces after-hours cancellations and unpaid empty miles.

FAQ

What is a standard TONU fee? There isn’t one in any authoritative sense — no regulation, index, or survey establishes it. Publishers report ranges around $150–$300 for standard equipment (FreightCenter, checked 2026-08-10), but those are observations, not data. Compute yours from empty miles and hours lost using the table above, and put the result in the rate confirmation before dispatch.

Who pays the TONU — the broker or the shipper? The broker owes the carrier whatever the rate confirmation promises. Whether the shipper reimburses the broker depends on the broker’s customer contract. If your customer contract is silent on cancellation charges and your rate cons promise TONU, that gap is your margin.

Does a carrier get TONU if the shipper says the freight isn’t ready? It depends on what happens next. If the load is cancelled, TONU. If the truck is told to come back tomorrow, that is normally layover. If it waits at the dock, that is detention once free time expires. Write all three into the rate con so nobody negotiates in the moment.

Can a carrier charge TONU without it being in the rate confirmation? It can invoice anything; collecting is another matter. Without a written trigger and amount the claim is a negotiation, which is why carriers that get burned start requiring TONU terms up front — and why brokers who offer clear TONU terms get covered faster on tight freight.