Pricing transport work is where margin is won or lost. Quote too low and you carry the job at a loss, quote too slow and the customer has gone elsewhere. Loaditude turns pricing into a repeatable process: define your rates once, then build a quote in seconds with the right rate applied automatically. This guide walks through setting up rates, adding surcharges, and creating and managing quotes, and finishes with a short note on how Loaditude itself is priced.
Step 1: Set your fleet rates
The foundation of a transport quote is a per-mile rate. Under TMS → Fleet Rates you create rate entries with a rate per mile and, optionally, the vehicle this rate applies to. A rate can be specific to a vehicle size class (from a small van up to a 7.5 tonne) and a body type (box, curtain side, refrigerated, and so on), or it can be a catch-all that covers anything you have not priced separately.
When a quote is built, Loaditude picks the most specific rate that is valid on the date and matches the vehicle. An exact size-and-body match wins over a size-only rate, which wins over a catch-all. Each rate has an effective-from date (and an optional end date), so you can schedule a price change in advance and keep an audit trail of what you charged when.
Step 2: Add client-specific rates for negotiated contracts
Most 3PLs do not charge every customer the same. When you have agreed a contract rate with a client, set it as a client-specific rate on that client’s record. A client rate always takes precedence over your company default, so the negotiated price is honoured automatically whenever you quote for that customer. There is no need to remember the deal or look it up: when a client rate is in play, the quote shows a clear badge telling you it is a contracted rate rather than the standard one.
Charging by zone instead of by the mile
Plenty of contracts are not priced by distance. They are priced by zone: a delivery into your Zone 1 costs the same whether the run came out at 30 miles or 45. Zones are yours to draw, per client, because a zone is a commercial decision rather than a geographic one. A zone covering “southern Scotland, the far South West and the Kent coast” makes perfect sense if they are all the same distance from your depot, and no standard map of the country will express it.
Draw the map once
On a client, open Delivery zones and add each zone with the postcodes it covers. Paste them however they come: commas, spaces or new lines all work, and anything that is not a postcode is ignored.
- An area like LE covers everything in Leicester.
- A district like LE11 covers only that one, and beats the area it sits inside, so you can carve an exception out of a wider zone without redrawing it.
If two zones end up claiming the same postcode, the client page says so. That matters because a drop there could take either price, and finding out on an invoice is worse than finding out while you are typing.
Then price against the zones
On a rate, switch Charged to Flat rate and choose the zone. Set it on Delivering to for the usual case, Collecting from to price on where goods come from, or both to price one specific lane.
Nobody picks a zone on a job. Loaditude works it out from the job’s postcodes.
Rates can also name a crew, which is how a white glove card is usually written: one person and two person prices for the same zone. Crew and vehicle both work, so you can price on either or on both. Crew has one practical advantage: a vehicle is usually assigned after a job is booked, so a rate naming only a vehicle cannot price the job until somebody assigns one. When that happens the job reprices itself.
A rate that names a zone beats one that does not, so a client can have agreed prices for their regular runs and stay on per-mile everywhere else, with nothing to switch between them. On a multi-drop job each drop is priced for its own zone and the prices are added up. Mileage is the exception: it belongs to the journey, so a per-mile rate is charged once however many drops there are.
Extras on a job
Assembly, packaging removal, a timed delivery, a failed delivery. Set them up on the client’s Rate Card as per-drop charges, then add them to a job from the Extras panel. They add to the delivery price rather than replace it, so a job that drove, installed and took the packaging away is charged for all three. Each one can sit on a single drop or on the whole job.
Work you have to quote for
Some destinations are priced on application. Set the rate to Price on application and leave the amount blank. Jobs matching it are flagged as needing a quote rather than being priced at nothing, which is the point: “£0.00” and “we have not agreed a price yet” should never look the same on an invoice. Once you have quoted, set the price by hand on the job.
Step 3: Define your surcharges
Line haul is rarely the whole price. Loaditude lets you add surcharges as separate, transparent line items so the customer sees exactly what they are paying for. Common ones include waiting time, tolls, congestion charges, ULEZ, out-of-hours work, and multi-drop premiums, and you can add a custom surcharge for anything else. Each surcharge can carry a quantity, so waiting time can be billed per hour and a multi-drop premium per drop, with the line value worked out for you.
Step 4: Build a quote
Under TMS → Quotes, create a new quote and fill in the details:
- Who it is for. Pick an existing client or type a prospect name, so you can quote for a customer you have not set up yet.
- The route. Add your stops by postcode. Loaditude looks each one up and calculates the distance for you, applying a road factor so the mileage reflects real roads rather than a straight line. Outward-only postcodes are accepted and flagged as approximate.
- The vehicle. Choose the size class and body type. The matching per-mile rate is applied automatically, including any client-specific rate.
- Surcharges and margin. Add the surcharges that apply and set a margin percentage. Loaditude shows a full breakdown: base cost, each surcharge, the subtotal, the margin, and the grand total.
If a job needs a one-off price, you can override the per-mile rate and record the reason, so an exception is deliberate and documented rather than a silent edit.
Step 5: Send, track, and convert
A quote moves through a clear lifecycle: draft, sent, then accepted, rejected, or expired, and finally converted. You can download a branded, customer-ready PDF that lays out the route, vehicle, line items, surcharges, margin, and total to send to the customer. When a quote is accepted, convert it into a transport job in one step. The agreed price and route carry straight across, so the work that gets booked is the work you quoted, with nothing re-keyed. From there it flows into dispatch and proof of delivery (see Transport jobs and proof of delivery).
Carrier rate cards for banded pricing
Alongside per-mile fleet rates, Loaditude supports fuller rate cards for operations that price by zone and weight rather than by simple mileage. A rate card belongs to a carrier and holds banded entries: origin and destination zones, vehicle type, weight or pallet bands, and the rates that apply (base rate, per mile, per pallet, per tonne, per drop, or a minimum charge). This is the right tool when you buy or sell freight on a tariff. For most own-fleet quoting, the per-mile fleet rates in the steps above are all you need.
How Loaditude itself is priced
Pricing for the platform is separate from the rates you charge your customers. In short, Loaditude’s standard plans (Starter, Professional, and Scale) are priced per full user, the people running the operation such as admins, dispatchers, and planners. Drivers and operatives are charged at a low seat rate of just £4.95 per user per month on any plan, so putting your whole floor on the system stays affordable. Plans differ by features rather than by user limits. The founding cohort is offered at a single flat rate for the whole operation, with no per-user fees. For current figures and what each plan includes, see the pricing page.
Where to go next
- Transport invoicing and billing covers turning delivered jobs into invoices.
- Transport jobs and proof of delivery covers what happens after a quote is accepted.