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Freight Broker Commission Percentage

Independent Freight Agents​

Freight agents have higher commission than employeed (W-2) freight brokers. These agents will work under a license freight brokerage, and focus on obtaining their own customers and growing their book of business. Back-office tasks such as billing, invoicing, claims, IT, rating, etc.. is handled by the freight brokerage.

  • Freight agents are generally on a commission split that will vary around 40-70% of the profit.
  • The licensed freight brokerage keeps 30-60% of the profit which is used for running the back-office tasks and their own profitability.

Employeed brokers (Floor-level)​

Employeed brokers are ones that are on a W-2, typically present at the mega-brokerages and often called "Floor-level" broker/representative. In this model, the brokerage will "own" the customer accounts, handle back-office operations, while providing the employees everything they need to operate (i.e. office, computer, etc...). This type of broker's pay has two parts:

  1. Base salary: In a 2022 survey done by FreightWaves, median salary for floor-level brokers was $48,000. This varies by region.
  2. Commission: In the same survey, the commissions for rate for floor-level brokers was 10% on Gross Margins