Every Freight Billing Deadline, With the Rule Behind It

Almost every freight billing argument is really an argument about a clock. The carrier rebills a March load in October. You find a duplicate payment from last year. A claim sits unanswered for five months. In each case the question is not who is right, it is whether anybody is still inside the window.

Most of those windows are written down, in federal regulation or statute, with numbers you can cite. The freight billing deadlines and statutes of limitations below are the ones that actually decide money. Every row links to the primary text.

Two cautions. Several of these are floors, not ceilings: 49 U.S.C. 14706(e) does not give you nine months to file a claim, it forbids a carrier from allowing less than nine months. And some provisions apply only to for-hire, non-exempt motor carriage. Read your contract alongside the regulation, not instead of it.

The deadline table

Deadline	What it governs	Who it binds	Citation	What happens if it passes
7 days	Presenting the freight bill (prepaid: from receipt; collect: from delivery)	Carrier	49 CFR 377.205	Out of compliance with the Part 377 credit rules
15 days	Standard credit period, from the day after the bill is presented	Shipper on credit	49 CFR 377.203	You are past the authorized credit period
Up to 30 days	Maximum credit period, if published in a tariff	Carrier and shipper	49 CFR 377.203	A longer credit term has no basis in Part 377
90 days	Revised bill assessing late-payment or collection charges, from expiry of the credit period	Carrier	49 CFR 377.203	The carrier loses the right to assess those charges
180 days	Billing charges additional to those originally billed, from receipt of the original bill	Carrier	49 U.S.C. 13710(a)(3)	The carrier loses the right to collect the additional charges
180 days	Contesting the original or a subsequent bill, from receipt of that bill	Shipper	49 U.S.C. 13710(a)(3)	You lose the right to contest those charges
Promptly, on receipt	Opening a file and investigating any overcharge claim, written or not	Processing carrier	49 CFR 378.5	No file, no trail, and no 60-day clock running
60 days	Paying, declining, or settling a written overcharge claim	Processing carrier	49 CFR 378.8	The carrier is out of compliance absent a written extension agreement
60 days	Notifying the payor of an unidentified payment	Carrier	49 CFR 378.9	Carrier obligation unmet
90 days	After notice with no response, unidentified funds may be treated as the carrier’s own	Carrier	49 CFR 378.9	Your money legitimately stops being your money
14 days	Refunding or responding once the payor supplies the identifying information	Carrier	49 CFR 378.9	Carrier obligation unmet
30 days	Refunding an overpayment, duplicate, or overcollection the carrier itself finds	Carrier	49 CFR 378.9	Duty is affirmative, not on request
No less than 9 months	Minimum filing period a carrier must allow on a loss or damage claim	Carrier (as a floor on its own terms)	49 U.S.C. 14706(e)(1)	A shorter contractual window is unenforceable; miss the real one and the claim dies
No less than 2 years	Minimum period a carrier must allow for suit, running from the carrier’s written disallowance	Carrier (as a floor on its own terms)	49 U.S.C. 14706(e)(1)	Suit is time-barred once the contractual period ends
30 days	Acknowledging a claim in writing, unless already paid or declined in writing	Carrier	49 CFR 370.5	A documented compliance failure you can cite
120 days	Paying, declining, or making a firm written compromise offer on a claim	Carrier	49 CFR 370.9	The carrier must instead issue a written status report
Every 60 days after 120	Written status reports while a claim remains unresolved	Carrier	49 CFR 370.9	Carrier obligation unmet
18 months	Civil action by a carrier to collect unpaid transportation charges	Carrier	49 U.S.C. 14705(a)	The carrier cannot sue you for the balance
18 months	Civil action to recover overcharges	Shipper or payor	49 U.S.C. 14705(b)	You cannot sue to recover
3 years	Complaint to the Board or Secretary to recover overcharges, if elected	Shipper or payor	49 U.S.C. 14705(b)	The complaint route closes
2 years	Complaint to the Board or Secretary for damages under 14704(b)	Shipper or payor	49 U.S.C. 14705(c)	The damages complaint is time-barred
Plus 6 months	Extension of the limitation period from written notice that a claim is disallowed	Both	49 U.S.C. 14705(d)	You lose an extension you were entitled to
Plus 90 days	Further extension from the date a carrier sues or collects the charges	Both	49 U.S.C. 14705(d)	Same
3 years	Federal government transportation, from payment, refund, or deduction	Government and carrier	49 U.S.C. 14705(f)	Recovery is time-barred
Delivery or tender of delivery	The event that starts the 14705 clocks	Both	49 U.S.C. 14705(g)	Not a deadline, but the date every 14705 clock counts from
30 days	Issuing an ocean demurrage or detention invoice, from the last day incurred	Billing party	46 CFR 541.7	The invoice is late under the FMC billing rule
At least 30 days	Requesting mitigation, refund, or waiver, from invoice issuance	Billed party	46 CFR 541.8	You lose the request window the rule guarantees you
30 days	Attempting to resolve that request, from receipt	Billing party	46 CFR 541.8	Obligation unmet, absent agreement to extend

Twenty-eight rows. The handful people get wrong are below.

The 180-day rule is the one that kills late rebills

49 U.S.C. 13710(a)(3) does two symmetrical things, and most people have only heard of one of them.

A carrier that wants to bill charges beyond what it originally billed has to issue that bill within 180 days of your receipt of the original bill to have the right to collect them. That is the answer to the balance-due invoice that shows up eight months after delivery, usually out of a post-audit by a third party the carrier hired. The load being real and the charge being arguably correct does not fix a bill issued outside the window. Late accessorial rebills are the common case: a detention line that surfaces months after the load is both outside the window and unsupported, which is why disputing a detention charge when the POD carries no in or out times usually starts with the invoice date rather than the hours.

The other half binds you. To preserve your right to contest the original or a subsequent bill, you have to contest it within 180 days of receiving it. A stack of unreviewed invoices from last year is not a to-do list, it is an expiring asset. That is the strongest practical argument for auditing on a weekly cadence rather than when someone finally has time, and the reason cadence, not depth, is the first thing to ask about when you compare what freight audit actually costs under each pricing model.

Two mechanics matter. The clock runs from receipt of the bill, not from delivery, so the AP inbox timestamp is worth preserving. And 13710 is written around the Board dispute process for motor carriers subject to that subchapter, so a negotiated contract can change the practical picture. Check your contract’s billing window before relying on the statute alone, and pull the load’s rate confirmation while you are there, since a rate confirmation that does not match the carrier invoice is often what generated the extra charge the carrier is now trying to bill.

Credit terms: the 15-day clock and the 90-day revised bill

49 CFR 377.203 sets a standard credit period of 15 days, beginning the day after the carrier presents the freight bill, extendable by published tariff provision to no more than 30 calendar days. 49 CFR 377.205 requires the carrier to present the bill within 7 days of receiving the shipment (prepaid) or 7 days from delivery (collect), and requires the bill to state the credit time limit, any late-payment penalty, any service or collection charge, and the discount terms.

The part almost nobody quotes is the back end. To assess a late-payment or collection charge, the carrier has to issue a revised freight bill within 90 days after the authorized credit period expires. A collection charge tacked on long after that has no Part 377 basis, whatever the letter says.

Part 377 applies to for-hire, non-exempt motor carriers and household goods freight forwarders extending credit. It is not a general payment-terms law and does not override net-30 terms you negotiated. Its value is as a reference point when a carrier’s collections process invents its own timeline.

A freight claim and a billing dispute are two different clocks

This is the most expensive conflation in the subject. People file a “claim” for an overcharge, then wonder why the nine-month number does not seem to apply.

A loss or damage claim is a cargo claim, under 49 U.S.C. 14706 and 49 CFR 370. Section 14706(e)(1) bars a carrier from providing a filing period shorter than nine months, or a suit period shorter than two years running from the carrier’s written notice that it disallows any part of the claim. That is the source of the “two years and one day” language on standard bills of lading: carriers write two years plus a day because two years flat would violate the floor. Once the claim is in, 370.5 gives the carrier 30 days to acknowledge it in writing, and 370.9 gives it 120 days to pay, decline, or make a firm written compromise offer, then a status report every 60 days until it is resolved.

An overcharge is a billing error on freight that arrived fine, under 49 CFR 378 and 49 U.S.C. 14705. Nine months and 120 days have nothing to do with it. The governing numbers are 60 days for resolution, 18 months to sue, and 180 days to have contested the bill in the first place.

Take that split if you take nothing else. Sending a duplicate-billing dispute on a cargo claim form routes it to a claims desk with no authority over billing, and the 180-day contest window keeps running while it sits there.

The 60-day overcharge clock only starts if the claim is written

49 CFR 378.8 requires the processing carrier to pay, decline to pay, or settle each written overcharge claim within 60 days of receipt, unless both parties agree in writing to extend for extenuating circumstances. Sixty days is a useful lever: it converts an indefinite wait into a date you can put in a follow-up email.

The catch is in 378.5. A carrier must promptly investigate and open a file on any claim it receives, written or otherwise, but only a written claim starts the 60-day clock. A phone call to your rep is not a claim. Neither, arguably, is a short-pay with no explanation.

49 CFR 378.4 says what to put in it: the freight bill, the rate, classification, weight, or tariff authority relied on, and the payment information. It also says inadequate documentation alone cannot disqualify a claim, so a thin file is a reason for the carrier to ask for more, not to refuse.

One companion duty most payors never invoke: under 49 CFR 378.9, when a carrier itself discovers an overpayment, duplicate payment, or overcollection, it must refund within 30 days. That is affirmative, not on request, though in practice you will find most of them yourself, which is why it pays to know the patterns that separate a true duplicate freight invoice from a legitimate rebill. The same section handles payments the carrier cannot identify: notify the payor within 60 days, treat the funds as its own after 90 days with no response, and refund or respond within 14 days once the payor identifies the payment.

Overcharge suits: 18 months to sue, 3 years to complain

49 U.S.C. 14705 is short and worth reading in full. The numbers are not symmetric in the way people assume.

A carrier has 18 months from accrual to begin a civil action to collect transportation charges. You have 18 months from accrual to begin a civil action to recover overcharges. But if the claim is against a carrier under chapter 135 and the election is made to file a complaint with the Board or Secretary instead of suing, the complaint window is three years. Damages complaints under 14704(b) run two years. Federal-government transportation gets three years from payment, refund, or deduction, whichever is later.

Two mechanics matter more than the raw numbers. Subsection (g) says claims accrue on delivery or tender of delivery, so the clock does not start at invoice date or payment date. Subsection (d) extends the period six months from written notice that a claim is disallowed, plus a further 90 days from the date the carrier begins a civil action or collects the charges. A disallowance letter is not purely bad news: it starts an extension.

Ocean demurrage and detention runs on a separate 30-day set

If you touch containers, the Federal Maritime Commission’s billing rule at 46 CFR part 541 adds three clocks with no motor-carrier equivalent.

46 CFR 541.7 requires the billing party to issue a demurrage or detention invoice within 30 calendar days from the date the charge was last incurred. 46 CFR 541.8 gives the billed party at least 30 calendar days from invoice issuance to request fee mitigation, refund, or waiver, and requires the billing party to attempt to resolve that request within 30 calendar days of receiving it, unless both parties agree to a longer period.

46 CFR 541.6 closes the loop by requiring the invoice itself to state those timeframes. An invoice missing them is defective on its face, which is a far easier argument than relitigating whether the free time was fair. Truckload detention has no equivalent invoice rule, so there the argument runs on the records that establish arrival, departure and dwell rather than on a defect in the bill.

What to do with all of this

Date-stamp receipt of every freight bill. Both 180-day windows in 13710 run from receipt, and the inbox timestamp is your evidence.
Review bills weekly, not quarterly. An invoice backlog is a decaying right.
Reject balance-due rebills issued more than 180 days after the original bill, citing 13710(a)(3), and check the contract for a shorter negotiated window.
Put every overcharge dispute in writing, with the freight bill and the rate or tariff authority attached, so 378.8 starts running.
Route cargo claims and billing disputes to different desks. Never let one sit in the other’s queue.
Diary the carrier’s clocks too: 30 days to acknowledge a claim, 120 to dispose of it, 60 to resolve a written overcharge claim, 30 for a self-discovered refund.
On container charges, check the invoice date against the last day the charge was incurred before anything else.
Keep documents through the longest clock that can touch them. With an 18-month suit window from delivery and a three-year complaint route on overcharges, two years of retention is short.

None of this requires software. It requires knowing which clock you are on, and writing the date down.