Some things just go together. Like peanut butter and jelly. Or, peanut butter and chocolate.  And, peanut butter and bananas… I’m sensing a trend here. You know what else goes together?  IFTA and TMS.

What is IFTA? Who Needs to File IFTA Reports? How Do I File Them?

We’ve talked about how our TMS can help you file IFTA fuel taxes.  But, you may need more information about IFTA.  So, before you head to the kitchen for a peanut-buttery snack, let us answer some of your questions about IFTA.  

• What is IFTA?  The International Fuel Tax Agreement simplifies the process of collecting and distributing fuel taxes.  Each jurisdiction you travel through receives a share of the fuel use taxes you pay.  Submit your report to your base jurisdiction and they disburse the taxes. 

• Who needs to file IFTA reports?  If you operate a qualified motor vehicle to transport property or persons, you must register with the IFTA.  You must also display IFTA stickers on your cab and have a current IFTA license, to be renewed yearly.  

• How do I file them?  Limited options for filing IFTA include:

1. Fill out the report manually and mail or hand-deliver it to your base jurisdiction office.
2. E-file using one of the many online services available.  These may include hidden fees, though.
3. Use a trucking management system to file your IFTA reports.

At TruckingOffice, we’ve made IFTA reporting easy and fast.  It’s just one more way our TMS helps truckers save time and increase profits.  

IFTA and TMS

There are a lot of things that have to work together in a successful trucking business.  The drivers have to know their destinations and the routes. The billing office has to get the BOLs to send invoices to the shippers.  The equipment has to be maintained. Filing IFTA taxes is only one small part of the trucking business.

So, how important is the IFTA module?  Why not just buy a stand-alone product that’s cheap?

Because cheap stand-alone programs give you what you pay for.

• Will you get updated tax rates accurately entered on time?
• Can you trust it to correctly compute the amount due?
• Will you enter the data correctly?  How will you know if you didn’t?
• Will the IRS accept it?

But most importantly, a stand-alone program is going to chew into your time.  How do the mileage numbers get into the program – someone’s going to have to enter them.  Will they have to do state by state or is there a routing system that will enter them for you?

Don’t you have something better to do – like running your trucking business?

Getting a complete trucking management software program is a much smarter solution.

TMS is your company’s peanut butter

Remember all those combinations I mentioned at the top of this post?  Peanut butter goes with everything, right? Peanut butter holds things together.  

That’s what a good trucking management software will do – hold your trucking business together. Each part of the business end has a module: 

• Dispatch
• Routing
• Driver management
• Load tracking
• Invoices, including late pays.
• Maintenance
• IFTA
• ELD.

When you’ve got the full package, then you’ve got the foundation for a successful peanut butter san… I mean trucking business.

IFTA and TMS and ELD?  Is that a thing?

It’s the future of IFTA:  getting the data from the GPS in an electronic logging device instead of from the routing records.  So getting a trucking management software that works with an ELD to compute the IFTA taxes is looking forward to the future of your trucking business.

Whatever happens in the future of trucking, the ELDs are here to stay.  Doesn’t making it part of the trucking management system make sense?  

IFTA and TMS should be together – just like peanut butter and chocolate.  But you know when you’ve gotten the real deal, and when an inferior product was switched in.  You need to be confident in what you’ve got isn’t going to leave a bad taste in your mouth.

TruckingOffice IFTA and TMS

We’ve only got a few days until the end of the month and IFTA is due.  You can probably find dozens of options online right now to help you finish.  Some of them probably say “free” but beware – free doesn’t mean what you think it does.

• Free may mean “we’ll let you enter your data and hold it hostage until you pay us for the report.”

• A free IFTA software may mean “you can enter your data, but if you want the current tax tables, you need to pay.”

• Free may mean that you can see part of the program – but not the whole.

In short, free isn’t free.  Free doesn’t promise a long term commitment to you as a trucker.  You’re just another customer.

That’s the difference with TruckingOffice.

We do offer a free trial – but it’s not just a taste of the program.  You’ll have access to every module. You can even sign up for the free trial with no credit card, debit card, or checking account number and do your IFTA right now.  In fact, we want you to! By learning how to enter data into the TruckingOffice Trucking Management Software, you’ll find how easy it is to use. And that IFTA report will print in a matter of seconds and let you get on with your life.

Spend your time off the road making peanut butter sandwiches for your kids with IFTA and TMS together.