A freight quote, step by step: from the route to the client PDF
What goes into a freight quote and in what order: the route, the ANTT floor, the tolls, the travel time, the driver freight, the company freight and the PDF the client gets.
By The CargoIA team4 min read
Every freight quote answers two questions: how much goes to the driver, and how much the company hiring the transport is charged. When both answers come out of the same calculation, you can show where each amount came from. In CargoIA, that calculation has seven steps.
1. The route
You enter the origin, the destination and, if you need them, stops along the way. The quote works out three routes (the shortest, the fastest and one that avoids tolls) and, unless you pick another, prices the shortest. Its distance is what the rest of the calculation stands on.
2. ANTT's minimum rate
With the distance, the cargo type and the number of axles, the quote works out the minimum rate of Lei 13.703/2018, Brazil's piso mínimo:
floor = distance × CCD + CC
Take the example from the post on the floor: dry bulk, 7 axles, whole vehicle, Dourados (MS) to Paranaguá (PR), 993 km. Under Portaria SUROC nº 22/2026, the floor is R$8,994.32 per trip. If the contract hires only the tractor, runs in high performance or pays for an empty return, the table changes, and the quote has an option for each of those cases.
3. Tolls, plaza by plaza
The floor leaves tolls out. The quote lists the plazas and free-flow gantries on the route in the order the truck passes them, and charges each one by its own table. If you enter a departure time, each plaza charges its tariff for that day and hour; without one, the weekday tariff applies. A plaza with no published tariff shows in the list with the reason and stays out of the total instead of counting as free.
4. Travel time
The map works out the time of a truck that never stops, and a professional driver has to. The quote applies Lei 13.103/2015: at most 5h30 of driving without a break, a 30-minute pause, 11 hours of rest in every 24 and a working day of 8, 10 or 12 hours at the wheel, depending on your operation's agreement. That gives the expected arrival, pauses included.
5. Per tonne, on four trucks
Grain freight is negotiated per tonne. The quote divides the trip by the load of a full truck, or by a weight you type, and shows all four trucks together: 6 axles (LS) · 32 t, 7 axles (bitrem) · 37 t, 7 axles (4th axle) · 39 t and 9 axles (rodotrem) · 50 t. On the example's bitrem, the floor comes to R$243.09 per tonne, plus tolls.
6. The driver freight and the market
In the quote, the driver freight is the floor, with the tolls apart. Next to it is what the market has been paying on the lane: the median of the listings per tonne, the range where half of them fall and whether demand is high or low. With the market well above the floor there is room to negotiate; with the market sitting on the floor there is little.
7. The company freight and the client PDF
Last comes what the company pays:
company freight = driver freight × (1 + margin) ÷ (1 − ICMS)
The margin and the ICMS come from the lane's settings or the organization's, and you can change both for that one quote. In the example, with a 10% margin and 12% ICMS (Mato Grosso do Sul to Paraná), the company freight is R$11,242.90 per trip, or R$303.86 per tonne, plus tolls. Tolls pass through with no margin and no ICMS, because vale-pedágio is not freight.
A saved quote becomes a PDF for the client with the company freight alone. The driver freight and your margin stay on your screen.
Why keep the two sides apart
Kept apart, each side can be negotiated on its own. The driver is paid an amount measured against the market and the floor, and the company gets a price that already includes margin, ICMS and tolls. Since every line cites its source (the ANTT act, the toll register, the date), the client can check the numbers.
See the plans and quote a route from your own operation.