Use Commodities and Accessorials Types to create the reusable items that appear in the Commodities and Accessorials table on a load. These types help your team record cargo, accessorial charges, payment advances, direct costs, and fees consistently across loads.

After a type is created, users can select it on the load screen, enter the quantity, description, weight, class, customer rate, and carrier or driver rate, and let Load Manager include the amounts in the load totals and reports.

Where to Manage Commodity and Accessorial Types

1. Go to All Loads >> Commodity Type.

2. Click Add New.

3. Enter the Code and Description.
4. Select the Type.
5. Complete the fields that apply to that type.
6. Click Save.

Choose the Right Type

The Type controls how the item is treated when it is used on a load. Choose the type that matches the business purpose of the row.

Accessorial

Use Accessorial for additional charges or reimbursements connected to a load, such as lumper fees, detention, layover, delivery fees, tolls, or fuel surcharge items.

Accessorials can be entered with customer and carrier/driver amounts on the load. They can appear on customer documents and carrier/driver-facing documents depending on how the row is entered and whether the item is hidden from the customer invoice.

Commodity

Use Commodity for freight or cargo being moved, such as produce, machinery, pallets, lumber, or other shipped goods.

Commodity rows are useful when you need to show cargo details such as description, quantity, weight, class, or handling unit. Commodity information can be used on documents such as invoices, rate confirmations, dispatch reports, and bills of lading when those documents are configured to display it.

Payment Advance

Use Payment Advance when money is advanced against a load and should reduce the total amount due.

Payment advances are subtracted from the load total. Use this type for advances that need to be tracked separately from normal accessorial charges or reimbursements.

Direct Cost

Use Direct Cost for a cost that should count against the load's profit but is not billed to the customer as a normal charge. Examples include a repair cost, internal expense, or other load-specific cost that affects margin.

Direct costs appear in the load's direct cost area and help calculate a more accurate profit for the load.

Fee

Use Fee for charges that Load Manager should calculate from a configured amount or percentage. A fee can be set up as a flat amount or as a percentage of the carrier total.

Fee types can be applied to the customer rate, carrier/driver rate, or direct cost, depending on the setup. If Automatically add to all new loads is selected, the fee is added when new loads are created.

Common Setup Fields

Depending on the selected type and your company's enabled settings, you may see these fields:

• Code: The short name users select in the Commodities and Accessorials table.
• Description: The longer description of the item.
• Type: Determines whether the item is an Accessorial, Commodity, Payment Advance, Direct Cost, or Fee.
• Active: Controls whether the type is available for users to select.
• Customer Rate: The default amount charged to the customer, when the selected type uses rates.
• Carrier Rate / Driver Rate: The default amount paid to the carrier or driver, when the selected type uses rates.
• Amount: The default amount for Direct Cost or Fee setup.
• Amt Type: For Fee types, choose whether the fee is a flat amount or a percentage of the carrier total.
• For: For Fee types, choose whether the fee applies to the customer rate, carrier/driver rate, or direct cost.
• Automatically add to all new loads: For Fee types, adds the fee to new loads automatically.
• Hide on Customer Invoice: Keeps the item from printing as a visible customer invoice line when selected.
• Taxable: Marks the item as taxable when Canadian sales tax is enabled.
• Handling Unit: Sets a default handling unit such as pallet, crate, box, bag, case, drum, roll, pipe, or other.
• EDI Charge Code: Connects the item to an EDI charge code when EDI charge code setup is used.
• Show Totals On Summary Export: Includes totals for this item in the summary export.
• Sales, Cost of Sales, and Bank Account: Accounting fields used for financial mapping. Payment Advance types use the Bank Account field instead of the regular sales and cost of sales fields.

How the Type Is Used on a Load

On the load screen, use the Commodities and Accessorials table to add one or more rows to the load. Each row can include:

• Qty: The quantity for the row.
• Type: The Commodity or Accessorial Type selected from your setup list.
• Description: Extra detail for the row.
• Weight: Weight for cargo or other items where weight matters.
• Class: The freight class, when applicable.
• Customer Rate: The amount charged to the customer.
• Carrier Rate / Driver Rate: The amount paid to the carrier or driver.
• Carrier %: A carrier percentage value when used by your workflow.
• Customer Charges and Carrier Charges: The calculated totals for the row.

The amounts from this table feed the load totals. Payment Advance rows reduce totals, Direct Cost rows affect profit, and normal Commodity or Accessorial rows can increase the customer and carrier/driver totals.

Assign a Type to a Specific Carrier or Driver

You can assign a Commodity or Accessorial Type to an individual carrier or driver when their default pricing should be different from your general setup.

Carrier Assignment

Open the Carrier Information page for the carrier and add the Commodity or Accessorial Type there.

Driver Assignment

Open the Driver Information page for the driver and add the Commodity or Accessorial Type there.

Tips and Best Practices

• Use short, clear names for the Code so users can find the correct item quickly on the load screen.
• Use Commodity for cargo details and Accessorial for extra service charges.
• Use Payment Advance only for advances that should reduce the total.
• Use Direct Cost when the amount should reduce profit but should not be treated as a normal customer charge.
• Use Fee for standard charges that should calculate from setup, especially when the same fee should apply to many new loads.
• Review Hide on Customer Invoice before saving if the item should affect totals but should not show as a separate customer-facing line.
• Keep inactive types instead of deleting them if they were used on older loads and you want historical load data to remain easy to understand.

Related Articles

• Show a Partial Customer Payment on an Invoice or Quote
• Load Screen Overview
• How to use Direct Cost to Calculate Accurate Profits for a Load
• Customer Invoice and Quote Layout
• Rate Confirmation Layout and Features
• BOL Report Layout