Moving Broker vs Carrier: How to Tell Who You Hired

The fastest way to tell a broker from a carrier is the public FMCSA register: a carrier holds motor carrier operating authority for its own trucks, while a broker holds broker authority and owns no trucks at all. The company whose name is on your quote and the company whose crew loads your sofa can be two different businesses, and federal rules say you must be told when that is the case.

Both can be legitimate. The trouble starts when you do not know which one you are talking to, so this guide is about finding out.

What a household goods broker is

Under 49 CFR 371.103 a household goods broker is a person, other than a motor carrier, that “sells, offers for sale, negotiates for, or holds itself out by solicitation, advertisement, or otherwise as selling, providing, or arranging for, transportation of household goods by motor carrier for compensation.” Brokers must register with FMCSA as brokers, separately from carrier registration, and must tell you they are brokers.

Subpart B of Part 371 then attaches specific duties:

• A broker may only arrange your move with a carrier that has a valid, active USDOT number and FMCSA operating authority to transport household goods (371.105).
• It must give every potential shipper who contacts it a list of all the authorized carriers it uses, with their USDOT and MC numbers (371.109).
• It must provide the federal consumer information, the “Ready to Move?” and “Your Rights and Responsibilities When You Move” publications (371.111).
• Any estimate it gives must be in writing and based on a physical survey conducted by the carrier on whose behalf the estimate is provided (371.113), under a written agreement with that carrier (371.115).
• It must disclose its cancellation, deposit and refund policies prominently on its website and in its agreements (371.117).

A broker that gives you a price without a carrier’s survey behind it is already outside the rules. That is the single most useful test, because it is the one most brokers who cause problems fail.

Who shows up, and whose number is on the bill of lading

The bill of lading is the contract. Under 49 CFR 375.505 it must carry the carrier’s legal or trade name as registered with FMCSA, plus the names, addresses, telephone numbers and USDOT numbers of every motor carrier participating in the transportation, along with the agreed dates, the valuation statement, every accessorial service ordered, and the estimate and inventory as attachments.

The moment of truth is pickup morning. If the name and USDOT number on the bill of lading match the company you booked with, you hired a carrier. If they do not, one of three things happened:

1. You hired a broker, and this is the carrier it assigned.
2. You booked through a van line agent, and the van line’s authority appears alongside the agent’s.
3. A carrier re-sold your job to another carrier, which some tariffs allow and which you should have been told about.

The first two are normal. The third is where you stop and ask questions before anything is loaded, and never sign a blank or incomplete bill of lading while you wait for answers.

How to read the register entry

Our September 23, 2026 copy of the FMCSA Motor Carrier Census shows 6,013 US carriers holding active interstate household goods operating authority under a moving-company style name. Every one of them, and every broker, has a public entry you can search by name, USDOT number or MC number.

What to read	A carrier looks like	A broker looks like
Entity type	Carrier (or carrier and broker, if it holds both)	Broker
Operating authority	Active motor carrier authority, household goods	Active broker authority, household goods
Trucks and drivers	Reports power units and drivers, however few	Reports none, because it has none
Safety record	Inspections, crashes and a rating where one exists	No roadside record of its own

Two cautions. A company can hold both authorities, in which case it may haul your move or farm it out, and you should ask which. And a “carrier” entry reporting zero trucks and zero drivers is a carrier on paper only. The directory at licensed movers by state lists carriers with their register data, and the six checks in how to check a moving company walk through the entry line by line. Which agency regulates what is set out in who regulates moving companies.

When a broker is the right call

Brokers exist because most carriers are small. In our state directory data the median fleet is 4 trucks and 64% of carriers run 5 trucks or fewer, so a carrier in one state often has no truck going where you are going in the week you need it. A broker’s legitimate job is to find that truck, and on an unusual route or a short timeline that can be worth paying for.

The other structure that puts a different name on your truck is the van line. National van lines book moves through agents, which are carriers in their own right; United Van Lines, the largest interstate mover in the register at 4,731 trucks, works this way, and its profile shows what a van line entry looks like. Among the 25 largest interstate movers, 7 are national van lines, 7 are agents of a van line and 11 are independent carriers. The differences are spelled out in van lines, agents and independent movers.

How broker moves go wrong

The failure modes are the same in nearly every complaint, and each one maps to a rule above.

• Large deposits. Carriers collect at delivery, up to the binding amount or 110% of a non-binding estimate. A broker that wants a large sum up front is financing itself with your money, and 371.117 is why its refund policy must be in writing.
• No survey. A quote built from a phone inventory is not an estimate under 371.113. It is a number designed to win the booking, and the real price appears at pickup.
• Re-sold jobs. A job passed to whichever carrier bids lowest arrives with a crew that has never seen your inventory and a bill of lading you have never read.
• Cubic-foot pricing. Interstate moves are priced on weight and distance. An estimate in cubic feet is a sign the numbers can be revised on loading day.
• Nobody to call. When goods are late or damaged, the broker points to the carrier and the carrier points to the broker. Interstate carriers must offer a neutral arbitration program; ask whose program covers your move.

The patterns behind these are described in moving scams red flags, and the estimate rules that protect you are in binding vs non-binding estimates.

Five questions to ask on the phone

1. Are you a motor carrier or a broker, and what are your USDOT and MC numbers? Then look them up while they are still on the line.
2. If you are a broker, which carrier will perform my move, and what are its USDOT and MC numbers? The 371.109 list is yours to see.
3. Who is doing the survey, in person or virtual, and will the estimate be binding?
4. What are your deposit, cancellation and refund policies, and can you send them in writing before I pay anything?
5. Whose name will be on the bill of lading, and which arbitration program covers the shipment?

A carrier answers all five in a minute. A broker who is following the rules answers them too, with a different name in the second one. The company that hesitates on the first question is the one to walk away from.