How Shippers Can Establish Trailer-Level Custody Through Carrier-Provided Enforcement
In road freight, shippers absorb the operational and economic consequences of loss, theft, misrouting, and non-compliance, even when execution is delegated to carriers and brokers. This exposure exists regardless of whether contractual liability formally rests elsewhere. Loss events consume shipper time, disrupt customers, and degrade service reliability.
The question facing shipper logistics and transportation managers is therefore not one of fault or accountability, but of control: How can a shipper ensure that custody requirements are enforced during execution when trailers, drivers, and day-to-day operations are controlled by carriers?
This paper addresses that question directly. It presents a practical model for how shippers can define custody requirements, decide where enforcement should reside, and require carriers or brokers to provide trailers equipped with the appropriate enforcement capabilities.
In this paper, enforcement does not refer to monitoring, oversight, or post-event investigation.
Enforcement refers to the ability to physically allow or prevent actions at the trailer during execution, based on predefined conditions, without requiring continuous supervision.
Specifically, enforcement means that cargo access, and where applicable movement of the trailer, is evaluated at the moment the action is requested against explicit criteria such as identity of person requesting access, time, and location. When those criteria are satisfied, the action proceeds. When they are not, the action is prevented or constrained, and proof of the decision is generated.
Enforcement in this sense is local, event-driven, and executable. It is distinct from visibility, which observes what happens, and from policy, which specifies what should happen. This approach removes the need for procedural seals as a primary control. Seals may still be used, but access enforcement no longer depends on them.
At the core of trailer-level custody is a structural decision about where enforcement authority resides during execution. There are two viable enforcement models in road freight.
In the first model, the carrier enforces shipper-defined custody requirements using enforcement systems it operates on the trailer. The carrier assumes custody under explicit, enforceable conditions and demonstrates compliance through proof generated at execution. Authority to grant access remains with the carrier, subject to the shipper’s specified rules.
In the second model, enforcement authority is explicitly assigned to the shipper or consignee. While the carrier continues to execute the move, access and, where applicable, movement authorization are enforced against shipper- or consignee-issued authority at the trailer itself. In this model, the shipper does not take operational control of the trailer, but retains control over access decisions.
In either model, authority can be assigned dynamically. The remainder of this paper examines how shippers can select between these two models and apply them in practice.
Shippers should not require the same level of enforcement for every load. As with insurance, compliance, and safety programs, custody requirements should be aligned with risk.
A risk-tiered approach allows shippers to define where enforcement is necessary and where procedural controls are sufficient.
At the lowest tier, shippers may accept procedural controls alone. These loads are low value, low diversion risk, and operationally forgiving. Seals, SOPs, and post-event visibility are adequate.
At the next tier, shippers require trailer door access to be enforced, not merely secured. This does not refer to mechanical padlocks, seals, or procedures that rely on driver compliance. It refers to systems that evaluate opening authority at the trailer itself and physically prevent access unless predefined conditions are met.
To be viable at scale, this enforcement must operate without manual intervention, without reliance on driver behavior, and without per-load setup. Access decisions must be executed automatically at the moment of opening, and generate verifiable proof regardless of who is operating the trailer.
This tier addresses common exposure such as pilferage, yard dwell, and drop-and-hook operations by replacing procedural controls with executable access rules that survive routine freight operations.
A higher tier adds conditional access. Door opening is allowed only when identity, time window, and location constraints are satisfied. This tier is appropriate where early pickup, impersonation, or appointment sensitivity creates risk.
At the highest tier, shippers require conditional immobilization. Movement of the trailer can be restricted when predefined breach conditions occur, such as unauthorized rerouting or access attempts.
Risk tiering provides a defensible basis for enforcement requirements and prevents overreach.
Risk tiering determines whether enforcement is required. The enforcement model determines who holds authority.
The choice between enforcement models is a function of how much operational flexibility a shipper requires after execution begins.
For freight where intent is stable and unlikely to change after pickup, carrier-enforced custody is sufficient. In this model, the shipper specifies custody conditions in advance, the carrier enforces those conditions at the trailer during execution, and proof is returned at close-out. The shipper does not need to participate during transit, coordination overhead is minimal, and the model aligns naturally with brokered freight and standardized operations.
In contrast, some freight requires the ability to adapt intent after pickup. Changes in delivery timing, destination, consignee authorization, or exception handling may be necessary while the load is already in motion. In these cases, shippers may require retention of access or movement authority. Enforcement remains local to the trailer, but authority to grant or modify access is issued by the shipper or consignee through a shared trust infrastructure.
This second model introduces additional overhead in the form of authority transfer and governance, but that overhead buys operational flexibility that does not otherwise exist. It allows shippers to adjust custody conditions during execution without renegotiation, re-tendering, or manual coordination with carriers, while preserving the carrier’s role in physical execution.
Both models are valid. The difference is not control versus trust, but whether custody conditions are expected to remain fixed or may need to evolve once the shipment is underway. Both models can coexist within the same network, applied lane by lane or load by load.
Once risk tiers and enforcement models are defined, the shipper’s task is not to deploy technology, but to specify capability requirements that carriers must be able to meet. These requirements express what the trailer must be capable of enforcing during execution, and where enforcement authority is expected to reside, without dictating how carriers implement those capabilities.
For a given tier, the shipper defines what the trailer must be capable of enforcing. For example, a load may require a trailer equipped with an electronically enforceable door lock that supports identity- and time-based access. Another load may additionally require conditional immobilization under defined scenarios.
The shipper does not dictate how the carrier implements these capabilities, only that the carrier must be able to demonstrate compliance. This approach mirrors how frameworks such as TAPA TSR are used to align expectations around facility and process security using a shared language of requirements, rather than prescriptive implementations.
The distinction is that, in this case, the shared language applies to execution at the trailer. Instead of certifying environments or procedures, the shipper specifies what actions must be enforceable during execution, and the carrier demonstrates that its equipment and operations can meet those requirements.
Carriers that possess trailers with the required enforcement capabilities can accept the load. Carriers that do not cannot. This mirrors how equipment requirements, temperature control, or regulatory certifications are handled today.
The matrix below illustrates how risk tier and enforcement model interact, and how authority can reside with the carrier or be assigned to the shipper or consignee without changing who executes the haul.
| Risk Tier | Operational Flexibility Required | Enforcement Model | Who Holds Authority During Execution | Typical Use Cases |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tier 0 | None | Procedural controls only | N/A | Low-value freight, loss-tolerant lanes |
| Tier 1 | Low | Carrier-enforced access control | Carrier | Pilferage-prone freight, yard dwell, drop-and-hook |
| Tier 2 | Moderate | Carrier-enforced conditional access | Carrier (within shipper-defined constraints) | Early pickup risk, appointment-sensitive docks |
| Tier 2 | Moderate | Shipper-assigned access authority | Shipper or consignee | Loads where access conditions may change post-pickup |
| Tier 3 | High | Shipper-assigned access + conditional immobilization | Shipper or consignee | High-value freight, rerouting or strategic theft risk |
Brokers operationalize shipper requirements through routing decisions. When a shipper specifies an enforcement tier as part of a load tender, the broker routes that load only to carriers that can meet the requirement.
Compliance becomes part of acceptance and close-out, not an afterthought. Proof of enforcement is provided alongside other delivery artifacts.
This approach does not require brokers to manage technology. It requires them to respect custody requirements in the same way they respect equipment, service level, and regulatory constraints.
By adopting a risk-tiered approach to custody and specifying enforcement as a carrier capability, shippers can achieve enforceable custody without disrupting execution. Access and, where applicable, movement rules are applied at the trailer, at the moment they matter. Proof is generated as part of execution rather than reconstructed afterward, shifting disputes from interpretation to verification.
More importantly, this approach moves shippers away from reliance on assumed compliance. Custody conditions are no longer implicit in procedures or contracts, but explicit, enforceable, and resilient to handoffs during execution.
In road freight, effective custody does not require ownership of trailers or direct operational control. It requires clarity about where enforcement authority should reside and discipline in expressing custody needs in a form that carriers and brokers can execute. Risk tiering determines when enforcement is required. The selected enforcement model determines whether authority remains with the carrier or is assigned to the shipper or consignee to enable post–pickup adaptability.
When these elements are combined, shippers can materially improve execution outcomes while preserving the delegated operating model on which freight depends. This approach does not introduce new power structures or require industry-wide change. It aligns authority, execution, and accountability using mechanisms that already exist, applied at the point of execution.
This is not a theoretical construct. It is a practical operating model that ensures access and movement authorization are enforced physically during execution, regardless of who owns the equipment.
One implementation of this operating model is provided by the Admiral Trust Infrastructure, which enables trailer-level enforcement of access and movement authority in both carrier-enforced and shipper-assigned custody models. Admiral Enforce is designed to operate within existing carrier and broker workflows, allowing custody conditions to be executed physically at the trailer without requiring asset ownership or continuous supervision.
Readers interested in how these concepts are implemented in practice can learn more at:
https://www.level5fleet.com/products/enforce
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