Flat Rate Or Mileage?

When operating an Oregon authority whether you are an Intrastate Carrier or Interstate Carrier with an IRP License you will be assessed road fees in the form of the weight/mile Tax. The decision to pay road taxes as a flat rate or based on mileage is a very critical decision. As of October 2010 all road assessments went up across the board. Oregon DOT encourages all carriers to use the Trucking Online website to pay road taxes and to make sure there are no mathematical errors when reporting.


To give you an example of how much these road fees have climbed to, a unit that is licensed for 80,000 lbs will pay approximately $16.00 for every 1000 miles traveled. As I have stated earlier it is critical to make the best decision as to how you will pay road fees. How many miles your company runs isn’t the only consideration, but generally those operations that run a lot of miles will save money by paying a flat rate. When registering your power units for flat rate you must also declare a commodity to be hauled. Any time your vehicles haul something that is not the declared commodity you will be subject to pay fees based on mileage for that commodity. Carriers are only allowed to change the status of how they pay road taxes once per year, you cannot go back and forth based on jobs that require that a lot of miles be logged.


For you heavy haulers you will be required to pay an additional annual extended weight permit in addition to be charged by axle weights. Remember that flat monthly fee reports are due by the 10th of every month and payments are to be included. A late report not postmarked by the 10th of the month will be subject to a 10% fee.


I highly recommend using MCTD (Motor Carrier Trucking division) Trucking Online website. Simply enter you Oregon mileages and the program calculates all fees error free and allows for direct payments. You can keep abreast of your account and make changes online really saving time and money.