Trucking Price Quote Template: Build One and Check Rates With AI

Build the quote from your own cost per mile (fixed costs, fuel, repairs, driver pay), add the empty miles to the pickup and your margin, then show fuel and extras on separate lines. Ask an AI assistant to re-check the arithmetic and flag odd assumptions. It checks the quote against your numbers; it cannot know the market rate.

Search results for this topic are mostly blank templates with empty boxes. The box that matters is the rate, and a rate is only as good as the cost sheet behind it. Below, one lane is worked from cost sheet to quote, then the quote goes through an AI check with a realistic answer, including the lines you should strike out of it. Every cost, rate and place in the examples is invented, and the units are miles and gallons (swap in kilometres and litres if you price that way; the logic is identical).

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What a trucking quote has to say besides the price

A quote that only gives a price invites an argument later about everything it left out. Before any arithmetic, decide the fields every quote will carry, because each one answers a dispute you would otherwise have after the load has moved.

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• Who and when: customer, contact, quote number, date, and how long the price stays valid.
• Where: pickup and delivery points with time windows, not just dates.
• What: equipment type, commodity, weight and number of pieces.
• How far: loaded miles, and the mileage source used to calculate them.
• How much: linehaul (the base charge for moving the load), the fuel surcharge on its own line, and any accessorials, which are the extras such as detention, extra stops or a truck-ordered-not-used fee.
• On what terms: payment terms, free time at each stop and what happens after it.

If quote requests reach you as emails, AI freight quoting from customer emails covers turning them into draft quotes. Once a request is in front of you, the template and the rate behind it decide whether the load pays.

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Cost per mile in four buckets, from your own statements

Your cost per mile is the floor under every quote. The version below uses four buckets and a single month of figures, and the numbers are invented, so replace each with a line from your own statements. If you want the full method for pulling them out of bank and fuel statements, cost per mile for trucking from your own statements goes step by step.

Divide by total miles, loaded and empty together, because the truck costs money on both. In this illustration the truck runs 9,000 miles a month, of which 7,920 are loaded and 1,080 are empty, a deadhead share of 12%. Fixed costs make up about 28% of the per-mile figure, which is why a quiet month with fewer miles pushes every quote's floor upward. The sums later use the spreadsheet's unrounded figure, $2.09778 a mile, so a calculator check gives the same cents.

Per-mile costing is a simplification, because rent, insurance and payments accrue by the day and not by the mile. It works while monthly miles are steady. It understates the cost of a truck that sits waiting, and that is exactly why detention is a separate line on the quote. The cells below keep the logic in a spreadsheet, so that the assistant never has to be the calculator.

Costs tab
B2   Monthly fixed costs               =SUM(B3:B8)        (the six fixed lines sit in B3 to B8)
B9   Total miles per month (loaded + empty)   9000
B10  Fixed cost per mile               =B2/B9
B11  Diesel price per gallon           3.90
B12  Miles per gallon                  6.5
B13  Fuel per mile                     =B11/B12
B14  Maintenance per mile              0.17
B15  Tyres per mile                    0.04
B16  Driver pay and payroll per mile   0.68
B17  Tolls and other per mile          0.03
B18  Variable cost per mile            =SUM(B13:B17)
B19  Total cost per mile               =B10+B18

Deadhead: the empty miles you drive to get paid

Deadhead means empty miles, most often the leg from wherever the truck finished its last job to the next pickup. The truck burns fuel, wears tyres and uses the driver's hours on those miles, and no customer pays for them directly. They have to be recovered through the rate on the loads you do haul.

The effect is easy to measure. Cost per loaded mile equals total miles times cost per mile, divided by loaded miles. With a pickup 85 miles from where the truck will be, a 640-mile load covers 725 miles in all, a deadhead share of 11.7%, and every loaded mile has to carry $2.376 of cost instead of $2.098. With a pickup 160 miles away the same load covers 800 miles, the deadhead share is 20.0%, and the price needed for the same 10% margin rises from about $1,690 to about $1,865. That is why far pickups deserve a separate deadhead line or a polite refusal.

Set a threshold from your own history, say 15% of total miles, and write it down. A rule you apply identically each time is worth more than a clever judgement on each quote, and it gives the AI check something definite to test.

Fuel: priced into the base, then adjusted on its own line

Fuel is the cost that moves between the day you build the cost sheet and the day the truck loads. The common convention in trucking explainers is a surcharge equal to the current diesel price less a reference price, divided by miles per gallon, multiplied by the miles driven, and zero when the current price is at or below the reference. There is no single standard, and base prices vary by contract.

The design used here is the simplest. The linehaul rate already contains fuel at the reference price on the cost sheet ($3.90). The surcharge line covers only the movement above that. With diesel at $4.20 in the pickup week, the gap is $0.30, which divided by 6.5 miles per gallon gives $0.0462 a mile, and over 725 miles that is $33.46. Some surcharge schedules start from a much lower base price and carry most of the fuel in the surcharge itself. That also works, as long as the linehaul then excludes fuel; the one mistake is counting fuel in both places.

State where the current price comes from, such as your fuel card's average pump price or a published weekly diesel average, and use the same source every time. The weekly mechanics, including how to set a schedule you can publish to customers, are in setting a weekly fuel surcharge rate for haulage quotes.

One lane quote, worked line by line

Here is the lane the rest of the tutorial uses. A customer wants one load moved a loaded distance of 640 miles from [City A] to [City B]. The truck will finish its previous job 85 miles from the pickup. Your target margin is 10% of the linehaul price, and diesel is $4.20 that week.

Note the order. Margin is applied to the cost of the whole trip, deadhead included, by dividing by 0.90 and not by multiplying by 1.10. The two give different answers: adding 10% to cost leaves a margin of only 9.1% of the price. Pick one definition of margin and keep it, because every later comparison with your accountant's figures depends on it.

The spreadsheet side of this lane is a second small tab, again with formulas so that the arithmetic is never typed by hand.

Quote tab
B2   Loaded miles                       640
B3   Deadhead miles                     85
B4   Total miles                        =B2+B3
B5   Cost to run the lane               =B4*Costs!B19
B6   Target margin                      0.10
B7   Linehaul price                     =ROUND(B5/(1-B6),0)
B8   Linehaul per loaded mile           =B7/B2
B9   Reference diesel price             =Costs!B11
B10  Diesel price this week             4.20
B11  Fuel surcharge                     =MAX(0,(B10-B9)/Costs!B12)*B4
B12  Accessorials (planned)             0
B13  Total quote                        =B7+B11+B12
B14  Margin on linehaul                 =(B7-B5)/B7

The customer-facing quote, blank and filled in

The customer-facing quote is plain text that you can paste into an email or a document. The blank version below is the template; the filled-in version underneath is the worked lane, with placeholders where a name or a place would go.

QUOTE [number]          Date: [date]          Valid until: [date and time]
Customer: [company]     Contact: [first name]

Pickup:   [location], window [date] [time] to [time]
Delivery: [location], window [date] [time] to [time]
Equipment: [type]       Commodity: [description]       Weight: [lbs]

Loaded miles: [n] (source: [routing tool])
Linehaul:            $[amount]
Fuel surcharge:      $[amount]  (diesel at $[price] against a reference of $[price], source [source])
Accessorials:        see terms below
TOTAL:               $[amount]

Terms:
Free time at each stop: [hours]; detention after that: $[rate] an hour.
Extra stops: $[rate] each. Truck ordered, not used: $[amount].
Payment terms: [days] from [invoice / proof of delivery].
This quote assumes [conditions] and is valid until the time shown.

QUOTE [number]          Date: [date]          Valid until: [date], 17:00
Customer: [company]     Contact: [first name]

Pickup:   [City A], window [date] 08:00 to 12:00
Delivery: [City B], window [next day] 08:00 to 16:00
Equipment: 53-foot dry van   Commodity: [description]   Weight: [lbs]

Loaded miles: 640 (source: [routing tool])
Linehaul:            $1,690.00
Fuel surcharge:      $33.46  (diesel at $4.20 against a reference of $3.90, source [fuel card average])
TOTAL:               $1,723.46

Terms:
Free time at each stop: 2 hours; detention after that: $60 an hour.
Extra stops: $75 each. Truck ordered, not used: $150.
Payment terms: 30 days from proof of delivery.
This quote assumes a standard dock-to-dock move and is valid until the time shown.

The accessorial amounts in the filled-in version are examples. Set yours from what a waiting hour or an extra stop genuinely costs you, and have any contractual wording read by a qualified adviser. If you want the assistant to draft the wording of the terms or the cover email, give it your fields and your numbers and say that it must not change any figure. Then compare the output with the template, line by line.

The same lane when the truck comes back empty

The worked lane quietly assumed that the truck finds another load at the delivery point. Often it does not. A delivery in a place where freight rarely starts means the driver may run home empty, and an empty return of 640 miles costs the same per mile as the loaded leg. This is one of the costliest assumptions a small carrier can make, so test it directly.

If you send the $1,690 quote and scenario C happens, the lane loses $1,173.47. In scenario B it loses $502.18. You have three options: pair the load with a backload you can name, price the empty return into the quote, or decline the lane. The first is usually best, and it is a question you should be asking before you quote. For a deeper look at which lanes earn a margin once real costs are in, margin by lane from a spreadsheet shows the analysis you can run afterwards.

The AI rate check: prompt, input and a realistic answer

Now the part the ranking pages leave out. Once the quote exists, give the assistant the quote, your cost sheet and your last five quotes on the lane, and ask it to check specific things. The prompt names the checks, forbids market-rate claims and sets the output format.

You are checking a trucking quote for a small carrier. Use only the numbers I give you. Do not state market rates; you do not have them.
1. Re-calculate every line and say whether each total matches.
2. Compare the linehaul per loaded mile with my last five quotes on this lane and say where it sits in that range.
3. Check profit: is the margin at or above my target?
4. Flag: deadhead share above 15%, any double-counting of fuel, missing accessorials (detention, extra stops, truck ordered not used) and any assumption about the return leg.
5. Schedule: divide total miles by 50 mph to get driving hours and say whether that fits the delivery window. Tell me to check the driver's legal driving hours; do not state a limit.
Return a table: check | result (OK or REVIEW) | one-line reason.

QUOTE: [paste]
COST SHEET: [paste]
LAST FIVE QUOTES ON THIS LANE (linehaul per loaded mile): 2.58, 2.71, 2.64, 2.80, 2.55
DELIVERY WINDOW: pickup 08:00 to 12:00, delivery next day 08:00 to 16:00

A realistic answer, with one line you should not keep, looks like this.

The last row is the one to watch for. Even with the instruction not to, assistants sometimes volunteer a market figure, and a made-up benchmark that is lower than your rate can talk you into a bad discount. Strike it and move on. The three REVIEW rows are the real value: a missing accessorial line, an unstated return-leg assumption and a delivery window that may not fit one driver's day are the things a person finishing quotes at the end of a long afternoon forgets. If the answer arrives with an arithmetic error in it, check the assistant's sums with a calculator and your sheet before changing anything; the spreadsheet is the authority.

What the assistant cannot know, and what to feed it instead

Some inputs can only come from you. Today's market rate on the lane is one, and so are the latest diesel price at the pump, your new insurance premium and the terms in a particular customer's contract. Supply what you can verify and leave the rest out of the prompt.

• Lane history: your last five or ten quotes on the lane, with the outcome (won, lost, no reply). That is a better benchmark than any generic figure, because it is your cost structure and your customers.
• Rates you have seen: a figure you read on a load board, typed in with its date, so the assistant knows where it came from.
• The cost sheet: pasted as a table, with the date it was last updated.
• Constraints: your deadhead threshold, margin target and driver availability.

Leave out customer names and anything covered by a confidentiality clause in a customer's contract. A lane described as "[City A] to [City B], dry van, 640 miles" tells the assistant everything it needs.

Mistakes that show up in quotes, with the sums

These five come from the same source: a number on the quote that nobody tied back to the cost sheet. Each has a sum you can run to see how much it costs.

1. Fuel counted twice. A surcharge worked out on the full $4.20 price instead of the $0.30 gap comes to $468.46 on 725 miles, against $33.46. The customer is charged $435.00 too much, and the quote is the one that gets rejected.
2. A stale cost sheet. Suppose the sheet still carries last year's driver pay of $0.62 and insurance at $1,300. The cost per mile reads $2.016 and the lane prices at $1,623.64. Against today's real cost of $1,520.89, that sale earns $102.75, a margin of 6.3% and not the 10% you meant.
3. Mileage that is not the paid mileage. If your routing tool gives 640 miles and the truck actually runs 5% more, that is 32 miles and $67.13 of cost nobody pays for. Use the same mileage source the customer uses, and compare it with your real odometer or fuel-card miles every month.
4. No detention line. A driver waits 3.5 hours with 2 hours free. At the example $60 an hour that is $90 you can only bill if the quote said so beforehand.
5. A far pickup priced like a near one. Keep the $1,690 price but start 160 miles from the pickup instead of 85, and the profit falls from $169.11 to $11.78, a margin of 0.7%.

Each mistake becomes a line in the AI check prompt, which is how the checklist grows from experience. Add the sixth when you meet it.

A monthly look back at quoted versus actual costs

A template decays unless it is compared with what happened. Keep a small log with one row per quote: lane, quoted linehaul per loaded mile, outcome, actual loaded miles, actual deadhead miles, actual fuel price and any detention. At month end, paste the log into an assistant and ask it to list the quotes where actual costs differed from the plan by more than a set amount, and what they had in common. Check its sums against the sheet.

Take one row as an illustration. The worked lane was quoted at $1,690 with 85 planned deadhead miles, but the truck started 110 miles away. That is 750 miles and a cost of $1,573.33, so the profit is $116.67, a margin of 6.9%. One lane is a blip; four with the same pattern means your deadhead assumption is wrong for that area, and the fix is to change the assumption, not to blame the driver. Recalculate the cost sheet when insurance, financing or driver pay changes, and at minimum once a month.

A spreadsheet and an assistant carry a small carrier a long way. Once you are quoting many loads a day, or need dispatch and invoicing tied to the same data, look at software built for the job; AI software for trucking companies: what to check for a small fleet lists the questions to ask. Whichever tool you end up with, the cost sheet and the rules above are what you take with you.

Questions small carriers ask about quoting with AI

Can AI tell me the market rate for a lane?

No. An assistant has no live rate data and will produce a confident-sounding figure that is a guess. Use it to check arithmetic, spot missing lines and compare a quote with numbers you supply, such as your last five quotes on the lane or rates you have seen on a load board and typed in yourself.

Should deadhead be a separate line on the quote?

Usually no. Build normal deadhead into the linehaul rate through your cost per mile. Show a separate deadhead line, or decline, when the pickup is unusually far, for example when empty miles would be above 15% of the trip. Pick a threshold from your own history and apply it the same way each time.

How often should I update my cost per mile?

Recalculate monthly from your statements, and straight away when a big cost changes: insurance renewal, a new truck payment, a driver pay rise or a sustained fuel price move. A cost sheet that is a few months old is the most common reason a quote that looks fine loses money.

Do I need a fuel surcharge on every quote?

Not necessarily, but you need a clear fuel rule. Either build fuel into the linehaul at a stated reference price and add a surcharge only above it, or use a surcharge schedule from a low base price. Whichever you choose, state it on the quote and never count fuel in both places.

Further reads

• AI for a Trucking Business: Can It Chase Late Invoices and Missing PODs? — Chase late invoices and missing proofs of delivery after the load runs
• How to Use AI in a Trucking Company: Load Paperwork Without Retyping — Stop retyping load paperwork once the quote is accepted
• Moving Company Quote Template: Hourly and Flat-Rate Lines With AI — See how another transport business quotes hourly and flat-rate jobs
• AI Tools and AI Development: The Complete 2026 Guide — the AI hub, including every tutorial in the AI-for-business series.

Sources: general fuel-surcharge practice (current diesel price less a reference price, divided by miles per gallon, applied to miles driven) as described in trucking trade explainers; all cost, rate and lane figures are invented for illustration.