Freight Factoring for Owner-Operators: Rates, Recourse and Contract Terms Checked on Vendor Sites (2026)

Say you bill $50,000 a month, about 20 loads at $2,500. At a 2% factoring fee you pay $1,000 a month to get that cash early. At 3% you pay $1,500. That $500 gap is $6,000 a year, and it's only the part of the cost you can see on the home page.

An advertised rate is a starting point, not a guaranteed offer. What you actually pay depends on how the advance, the reserve and the fee are split, what happens when a broker doesn't pay, and what the contract charges you for transfers, low months and leaving. This guide goes through each of those in the order the money moves.

Quick answer: Price every factoring quote on the same invoice: how much arrives up front, how much is held back, what the fee is and when it's taken. Then check what the factor's "non-recourse" actually covers, and get every other fee in writing. For a one-truck operation, check the volume minimum and the exit fee as carefully as the rate.

Every rate and term below is what the factoring companies publish on their own websites, as we read them on 2 November 2026. A published rate is not an offer, and we have not confirmed these figures with each company. The price you are actually quoted may depend on your monthly volume, the contract term, whether the deal is recourse or non-recourse, the credit and payment habits of the brokers you haul for, and other conditions. Several of these companies say so on the page. Use the figures as a starting reference for your own written quotes.

How the Money Moves on One Invoice

Three numbers decide what you get from a factored invoice: the advance, the reserve and the discount fee.

Orange Commercial Credit prints a worked example on its site for a $10,000 invoice with a flat 3.0% fee:

• Without a reserve, the advance is $9,700. The $300 fee is taken at funding, and nothing is held back.
• With a 1% reserve, the advance is $9,600. The same $300 fee is taken at funding, and the $100 reserve is "held and returned to you on the cycle after the invoice is paid in full."

The fee is $300 in both cases. The reserve changes when you get the last $100, not how much the factoring costs you.

Other factors take the fee at the end instead of the start. RTS says on its freight factoring page that it "advances more than 90 percent of the total within 24 hours" and, once the invoice is paid, sends "the remaining balance minus a small fee." Orange describes its standard program the same way: an advance that "can be as high as 98% of the invoice," and when your customer pays, the remainder minus a discount fee "which can range from 1.25% - 5%."

So a 97% advance and a 90% advance can cost exactly the same. The advance determines how much cash you receive immediately. The factoring fee and any additional charges determine the total cost. Ask every factor for both numbers on the same invoice amount.

Some factors say they hold no reserve at all. Nationwide Commercial Credit advertises "full advance (No Reserve)" on its trucking factoring page, Saint John Capital lists "No Reserves" on its site, and DAT Outgo describes its owner-operator factoring as having "no minimums, no reserves, and no sign-up costs."

What "Non-Recourse" Covers Depends on the Factor

With recourse factoring, the risk stays with you. Love's Financial puts it plainly on its freight factoring page: "the trucking company retains liability for the ultimate collectability of the factored invoice." Love's adds that recourse "is generally available at a lower discount rate" because the factor carries less risk, and it lists reasons an invoice may become uncollectible, including a customer that files bankruptcy, goes out of business, or has a "claim/dispute on the load."

Non-recourse moves some of that risk to the factor. How much depends on whose definition you're reading.

• Love's Financial defines non-recourse as the factor assuming the risk "if the customer does not pay the invoice due to an insolvency or a credit event, even if bankruptcy is not filed."
• Nationwide Commercial Credit describes its program as "Non-Recourse with Credit Protection to prevent chargebacks on non-payment due to insolvency."
• OTR Solutions markets what it calls "True Non-Recourse" factoring, "with no chargebacks, even after 90 days," and says its carriers stay paid even if the broker defaults on payment or goes out of business.
• eCapital notes on its freight factoring page that "no universal definition specifies the liability's circumstances" in non-recourse factoring.

Insolvency, or a broker going out of business, is the event these definitions name. A broker who refuses to pay because of a damage claim or a paperwork dispute is a different situation, and the definitions quoted above don't all say how they treat it. Ask each factor, in writing, which nonpayment reasons its non-recourse covers and which ones come back to you as a chargeback.

What the Sites Say About Rates

Here is what each company publishes on its own site. None of these figures is an offer. An "as low as" figure is an advertised starting point, not a guaranteed offer, and the rate you are quoted may depend on your monthly volume, the contract term, recourse or non-recourse, your brokers' credit and how fast they pay, and other conditions.

• **Bay View Funding:** "Rates as low as 0.5%," with an asterisk that reads "rates subject to change."
• **Cashway Funding:** "Rates as low as 1.95%," with "no monthly minimum requirement" and no long-term contract.
• Nationwide Commercial Credit: a flat fee of 2% to 3% with full advance on its non-recourse program, and "Custom rates available for monthly commitment of $150,000."
• **Viva Capital:** an online fee calculator whose default view shows "Your Estimated Fee 2.25% For 30 Days," with a disclaimer that "the fees shown are only estimates." The smallest monthly volume option in the calculator is $50,000 to $75,000.
• Orange Commercial Credit: a discount fee range of 1.25% to 5%.
• RTS: the rate estimate form on its freight factoring page says the rate shown "is an estimate only and does not represent a guaranteed offer" and that "Final rates and approval will vary based on full underwriting."
• Love's Financial: "Up to 99% access to cash from your invoices." That's an advance figure, not a fee.

The published number is where a quote starts, not where it ends. Viva's calculator, for example, asks for your monthly volume and how many days your customers take to pay before it shows a fee, Nationwide ties custom rates to a monthly commitment, and Love's says recourse is generally priced lower than non-recourse.

See every freight factoring company we list

TruckMyApps lists 35 freight factoring services, from RTS and OTR Solutions to smaller independent factors. Open a listing to read what it offers, then request a written quote on the company's own site.

See freight factoring companies →

Contract Terms That Cost More Than a Point of Rate

Transwest Capital, itself a factoring company, lists the fees a carrier should look for in a factoring agreement on its freight factoring page:

• Invoice processing fee, charged on each invoice.
• Monthly minimum volume fee: "If you don't invoice enough, the factoring company charges a penalty fee."
• Credit check fee for checking your customers.
• Wire and ACH transfer fees each time money is sent to you.
• Early termination fee if you end the contract before the agreed term.

It also warns about the contract length itself. Some factors offer 6, 12, 18 or 24 month contracts and others month-to-month. If the termination terms are restrictive and you miss the cancellation deadline, "your service will automatically renew."

For an owner-operator, the minimum volume fee is the one to watch. A month off the road for a repair or a family emergency is a month you might pay a penalty for not factoring.

Several companies advertise the opposite terms:

• EZ Freight Factoring lists "Month-to-Month Contracts," "No Minimum Volumes" and "You Decide Which Customers to Factor."
• Little Mountain Factoring says it has "no contracts and no fees to leave ever."
• Orange Commercial Credit says "There are no minimums and no quotas."
• Integrity Factoring advertises "No ACH or wire fees."
• Saint John Capital offers same day wire "for a small fee" or next day ACH "for free."

Viva Capital makes the same point on its own site: "Asking each provider for a written quote that lists all fees makes the comparison clearer."

Fuel Advances Are a Separate Line

Many factors also offer an advance at pickup so you can fuel the load before you deliver it. Saint John Capital offers a "50% fuel advance at pick-up," and EZ Freight Factoring lists "Fuel Advances up to 50 percent." Treat that as its own product with its own price, and ask how the advance is repaid out of the invoice.

We cover how fuel advances work, and who offers them, in our guide to fuel advances and fuel programs for truckers. Factor-linked fuel cards are compared in our fuel card guide.

Run Your Own Numbers

Take one real invoice from last month and price it at every factor you're considering.

1. Write down the invoice amount and how many days your broker took to pay it.

2. Get the advance percentage and the reserve in dollars, so you know what lands on day one.

3. Get the fee in dollars, and ask whether it changes if the broker pays in 45 or 60 days instead of 30.

4. Add every per-invoice and per-transfer fee. If you fund 20 times a month, multiply each per-funding fee by 20.

5. Read the minimum volume, the contract length and the exit fee. Put a dollar figure on a slow month and on leaving early.

Done that way, the quote with the lowest rate isn't always the cheapest one. You won't know until you write it out.

Which terms matter most depends on how you run:

• If you run one truck and want flexibility, start with factors that publish no volume minimums, such as EZ Freight Factoring, Orange Commercial Credit or DAT Outgo, or no long-term contract, such as EZ Freight Factoring, Cashway Funding or Little Mountain Factoring. Then compare their fees on your invoice.
• If one broker default would hurt you badly, put the non-recourse definitions of Love's Financial, Nationwide Commercial Credit and OTR Solutions side by side and ask each one about disputed loads.
• If you only need cash now and then, look for a factor that lets you choose which invoices to sell and charges nothing in the months you don't use it.

Get two written factoring quotes

Open the TruckMyApps freight factoring list, pick two companies with the contract terms you want, and request a written quote with every fee from each one on its own site.

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We read the freight factoring pages of Orange Commercial Credit, RTS, Nationwide Commercial Credit, Saint John Capital, DAT Outgo, Love's Financial, OTR Solutions, eCapital, Bay View Funding, Cashway Funding, Viva Capital, Transwest Capital, EZ Freight Factoring, Little Mountain Factoring and Integrity Factoring on 2 November 2026. Rates and terms are compiled from those sites, not confirmed with each company, and factors change them often. Your contract is what counts. This is not financial or legal advice. Directory counts are TruckMyApps data as of 2 November 2026.