Hank Seaton, with the Seaton & Husk law firm, spoke at the National Association of Small Trucking Companies’ annual conference a couple weeks back about what he called Fraud Prevention and Supply Chain Protocol. He offered what he feels is a possible preventive fix to the crime of double brokering when misrepresentation is involved.
In today's edition of Overdrive Radio, drop into a long talk with Seaton about somewhat simple steps carriers, brokers and shippers working together can take to stop these schemes in their tracks, whether involving carrier and broker identity theft or the insidious and perhaps more widespread presence of authorized carriers and brokerages set up seemingly for the purpose of simply double-brokering loads.
[Related: FMCSA/DOT getting serious about double-brokering?]
The honest players in trucking simply must work together both to prevent this kind of thing from ever happening, as he sees it, and elevate the issue so that rules against it are enforced meaningfully.
"I'd like to see this raised to the level of attention that, if the FMCSA doesn't have the manpower ... the Department's Inspector General just sets up an enforcement group," he said. "Other regulated industries, like particularly the Federal Maritime Commission, they're much more proactive in terms of protecting business practices, ensuring fair play in business practices. Fraud is hardly fair play in business practices."
