BOL
A BOL, or bill of lading, is the shipping document that lists the freight, the parties, and the terms, and that travels with the load.
Last updated 11 October 2026.
The driver carries it. The shipper describes what shipped: pieces, weight, commodity, origin, destination, and any special handling. The receiver signs it, and that signed copy often becomes the proof of delivery. If the bill of lading says one count and the receiver signs for another, the claim starts from those two numbers.
Brokers sometimes treat the bill of lading as the rate confirmation. They are different jobs. The bill of lading is the shipping paper. The rate confirmation is the money agreement between you and the carrier. A rate handwritten in the margin is a bad place to keep the only copy of the deal. Put the rate on the rate con. Put the freight facts on the bill of lading.
The fields people re-key are the ones that go wrong: the reference number, the weight, the piece count, and the seal. A build that copies the tender and never looks at the bill of lading the driver actually took can miss a last-minute change on the dock. The document that left with the truck is the one that describes the freight.
FreightScout pulls those fields off the paperwork on the load, and you approve them before the note is written. It does not treat a bill of lading as a rate confirmation, and it does not invent a piece count. How FreightScout reads shipping documents.
Questions people actually ask
Why keep the rate off the bill of lading?
Because the bill of lading rides with the freight and gets marked up at the dock. The rate confirmation is the agreement you will pay against. A rate that exists only in the margin is easy to lose.
What if the signed count does not match the bill of lading?
That difference is the start of a claim. It is a fact on the paper, not a story you reconstruct later. FreightScout does not invent the piece count.