Who We Help · Truckers · Bookkeeping
Trucker bookkeeping: settlements, cost per truck, and IFTA-ready records
The settlement statement from your carrier is a net number: line-haul and fuel surcharge at the top, then fuel advances, insurance chargebacks, and escrow before anything reaches your bank. We build owner-operator books from that statement — gross revenue rebuilt, every cost coded to its truck, kilometres and litres compiled by jurisdiction so IFTA quarters take minutes, not weekends. It is the bookkeeping we run for owner-operators and small fleets around Brampton, our home turf.
By the AnalytIQ Accounting team · Last reviewed: August 12, 2026
Start from the settlement statement, not the deposit
Whether you run under a carrier's authority or your own, the money arrives as a settlement: gross revenue at the top, then a column of deductions before the figure that hits your bank. Booking that deposit as income makes a strong week look thin and buries your real operating costs inside a single net number.
We post the gross, then give every deduction its own account, so the settlement reads like a small income statement and the deposit is just the reconciliation at the bottom.
| Settlement line | Where it belongs in your books |
|---|---|
| Line haul and fuel surcharge | Revenue — the surcharge is income, kept visible against actual fuel cost, not netted into it |
| Fuel advances and card deductions | Fuel expense, coded to the truck that pumped it |
| Insurance chargebacks | Insurance expense — cargo, liability, and buy-down each tracked on its own line |
| Trailer rent, plates, and admin fees | Equipment and carrier-fee expenses, separated so you can compare carriers |
| Maintenance escrow | A balance-sheet asset — it is still your money until spent |
| Claims and damage deductions | Expense, tracked separately so patterns show up early |
Cost per kilometre, truck by truck
One profitable unit can hide another that loses money every time it rolls. We set each truck up as its own class in QuickBooks Online, so fuel, 407 ETR and US tolls, repairs, tires, insurance, and IRP plating land against the unit that incurred them — with receipts captured through Dext from the driver's phone instead of a shoebox in the sleeper.
Split those costs into fixed and variable and you get the number that should drive every dispatch decision: your all-in cost per kilometre. Once you know it, a cheap spot-market load stops being a judgment call. Below the line, the truck stays parked; above it, you roll. Small fleets get a monthly per-unit summary — revenue, variable cost, contribution — which is the report that tells you whether to add a truck or retire one.
IFTA-ready kilometres and litres, every quarter
An IFTA return is only two data sets — distance travelled in each jurisdiction and fuel purchased in each jurisdiction — but assembling them the week the return is due is how errors happen. We pull jurisdiction kilometres from your ELD and litres from fuel-card statements every month, reconcile card totals against the fuel advances on your settlements, and keep the receipts attached to the entries.
The payoff goes beyond a painless quarterly filing. Distance records are what defend you in an IFTA or IRP audit, where gaps in the logs turn into estimated assessments, and the same kilometre data feeds your IRP renewal without a second compilation.
Factoring fees without double-counted revenue
If you factor your invoices, the most common error we inherit is counting the factor's advance as income on top of the invoice itself. The invoice is the revenue. The advance is a payment against it, the factoring fee is a finance cost worth watching as a percentage of gross, and the reserve the factor holds back sits as a receivable until released.
Recourse matters too. When a broker fails to pay and the factor charges the invoice back, your books should show a chargeback receivable to chase — not a mystery hole in this week's deposit.
USD loads, zero-rated freight, and the GST/HST refund
Cross-border work adds two layers. First, US loads pay in USD: we reconcile a USD account and convert at proper rates, so exchange gains and losses appear as their own line instead of noise in your margins. What US-source revenue means for treaty positions, protective 1120-F filings, and per-diem versus Canadian meal-claim methods is covered in our cross-border tax guide for truckers.
Second, GST/HST usually runs in your favour. Interline freight — an owner-operator hauling under contract to the carrier that invoices the shipper — is zero-rated, and so is international freight with an origin or destination outside Canada. You charge no tax on those revenues yet claim input tax credits on Canadian fuel, repairs, and truck costs, so many quarters the GST34 return produces a refund. That only works if the ITCs are captured monthly, which is exactly what the bookkeeping is for. Meal receipts and logbooks matter here as well, since long-haul drivers can deduct 80% of eligible meal costs instead of the usual 50%.
Source: CRA — GST/HST Memorandum 28-2, Freight Transportation Services.
Common questions.
Do you book the carrier deposit or the settlement statement?
The settlement. We post gross line-haul and fuel surcharge as revenue, give every deduction its own account, and reconcile the deposit against the statement — so the books show what you earned, not just what arrived.
What do you need from me for IFTA?
Access to your ELD for kilometres by jurisdiction and your fuel-card statements for litres by province and state. We compile both monthly, so the quarterly return is a summary rather than a scramble.
How should factoring show up in my books?
The invoice is revenue, the advance is a payment against it, the fee is a finance expense, and the reserve is a receivable until the factor releases it. Chargebacks under recourse go back into receivables to collect.
Related reading
Books that know your cost per kilometre.
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