You cannot sell or rent a USDOT or MC number, and FMCSA will shut yours down if you try

What the notice really said

Someone on social media was offering an MC number for rent. FMCSA's position is much clearer than the ad: a USDOT number identifies one legal person permanently and cannot be sold, transferred, rented or leased.

Operating authority can change hands only inside a legitimate corporate transaction in which management control carries on. If FMCSA finds a back-alley sale, it inactivates the USDOT number and revokes the linked registrations, meaning the 31134 safety registration and the 13901 to 13905 authority.

Back in the ICC days, operating authority was a scarce permit that could be assigned to someone else. Congress ended that scarcity. Treating an MC like a parking pass is exactly how hostage freight and chameleon carriers get started, and FMCSA's notice draws the line plainly.

An ad offering to "lease the authority" is a federal problem and no kind of growth hack. Royser will not put MC# {{MC}} on someone else's door for a fee.

"Chameleon carrier" is industry slang for a company that comes back under a new number after being shut down, which is the behavior this notice targets. A corporate merger is something for lawyers and has nothing to do with a handshake at dispatch.

How it plays out at the desk

We are the carrier whose name is on the truck. Our packet is available, and you can also read broker versus agent and the marking rule.

Shippers who want the actual truck instead of a remix can start at Price a lane. If you are eyeing a cheap new-entrant MC, read 16 automatic fails.

A rate confirmation carrying a rented number is how the double-brokering mess begins at the gate, and we refuse to be on the other side of that handshake.

Find out more about the carrier on the door, a newly registered Royser with its own trucks, at About Royser. Phone: +1 (224) 877-0350.

Where Royser draws the line

Royser will not lease MC# {{MC}} or USDOT# {{USDOT}}. Neither number goes onto another company's door in exchange for a fee.

We also will not treat a social-media story about someone who "bought an MC" as normal onboarding. FMCSA says it will revoke those. A real corporate transaction belongs in a lawyer's file, not in a dispatch file.

Looking for our truck? Call +1 (224) 877-0350 and talk to a real person. The number on our door is ours alone.