Pillar 1 — Detention Recovery

What Evidence Do You Need to Win a Detention Dispute?

Dwell Editorial · Updated 2026-04-24
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What Evidence Do You Need to Win a Detention Dispute?

The evidence that wins detention disputes is GPS-verified arrival and departure timestamps, corroborated by ELD data from the same stop. Two independent, hardware-timestamped sources remove the broker’s ability to claim your truck arrived later than documented — which is the argument behind most disputes. Manual timestamps, driver notes, and BOL entries rarely survive a serious challenge.

Why Evidence Is the Deciding Factor

The ATRI 2024 Detention Study found that fewer than 50% of detention invoices are actually paid, despite 94.5% of carriers billing for detention. The gap is not legal gray area — it’s documentation quality.

Brokers dispute invoices carriers can’t defend. Their challenge is almost always the same: “Your truck arrived later than you claim” or “The timestamps you submitted aren’t verifiable.” If your only documentation is a driver’s handwritten note or a time the dispatcher entered from memory, the broker is right — it isn’t verifiable. The claim dies.

The solution isn’t better paperwork. It’s better data.

The Evidence Hierarchy

Not all evidence is equal. Here’s how different evidence types perform in real disputes and in formal arbitration:

Tier 1: GPS + ELD Dual-Source Documentation (Strongest)

The gold standard for detention evidence is a dual-source package that includes both GPS location data and ELD activity records from the same stop. Both data streams are:

A GPS record showing your truck entered the facility geofence at 9:03 AM — corroborated by an ELD log showing the engine went to idle at a location matching the facility address at 9:04 AM — gives a broker almost nothing to dispute. Two independent data sources, neither dependent on human input, both pointing to the same facts.

This is the evidentiary standard Dwell generates for every detention event automatically from existing Motive telematics data.

Tier 2: Single-Source GPS or Telematics Report (Strong)

A telematics report from your ELD provider showing geofenced arrival and departure times is strong evidence on its own. Most brokers will not dispute a clean GPS report from a recognized telematics provider.

Weaknesses:

If you have GPS but not ELD corroboration, this is still your best documentation option.

Tier 3: Facility Check-In / Check-Out Records (Moderate)

Some facilities issue gate tickets, check-in receipts, or scale tickets that timestamp a truck’s arrival and departure. These are valuable supplemental evidence.

Limitations:

If your drivers are at facilities that issue gate tickets, make it a standing practice to photograph them before leaving the facility.

Tier 4: BOL With Noted Times (Weak)

A bill of lading with arrival and departure times written by the driver is the most common “evidence” submitted with detention invoices and the weakest. It’s driver-entered, not hardware-timestamped, and immediately challengeable.

The BOL is still worth including in your documentation package — it establishes the load details and can corroborate other evidence. But it should never be your primary evidence source.

Tier 5: Driver Testimony / Dispatch Notes (Weakest)

A driver’s statement or a dispatcher’s notes about arrival/departure times carry almost no evidentiary weight in a dispute. These are the easiest for brokers to challenge and the least likely to hold up in TIA arbitration.

What Brokers and Arbitrators Look For

When a detention dispute goes to TIA arbitration, the arbitrator is evaluating:

  1. Was detention contractually covered? — Does the rate confirmation include detention terms and rates?
  2. Did detention actually occur? — Is there hardware-verified evidence that the truck was at the facility beyond the free time allowance?
  3. Was the invoice submitted within the claim window? — Did you submit within the timeframe specified in the rate confirmation?
  4. Is the amount correct? — Does the invoice math match the documented time and the contracted rate?

Strong documentation answers all four questions in your favor before the broker can raise them.

Building Your Standard Evidence Package

Every detention invoice should be submitted with a standard evidence package. Here’s what to include:

Required:

Strongly recommended:

Include if available:

Submit all of this in a single email or portal upload. A well-organized, complete package is faster for the broker’s billing team to review and approve — and it signals that you know what you’re doing, which deters frivolous disputes.

When Evidence Isn’t Enough

Sometimes a broker will dispute a claim even with strong GPS evidence. At that point, the evidence becomes the basis for formal escalation — TIA arbitration, FMCSA complaint, or surety bond claim.

In TIA arbitration, GPS + ELD documentation is the accepted standard. Brokers who dispute timestamped, hardware-verified data typically lose those proceedings. The threat of arbitration alone, when backed by solid documentation, resolves most disputes before they get that far.

Automating Evidence Collection

The biggest operational challenge for most carriers isn’t knowing what evidence they need — it’s capturing it consistently on every load across every driver and every lane.

Manual evidence collection breaks down because:

This is the workflow problem Dwell solves. By connecting to your existing Motive telematics data, Dwell monitors every stop, captures GPS + ELD evidence automatically when detention occurs, and assembles the evidence package without any dispatcher action. By the time you’re ready to submit an invoice, the evidence is already built.

Join the Dwell waitlist — no new hardware, no changes to your dispatch workflow.

Automate what you just read about.

Dwell connects to your Motive account, detects detention automatically, and builds the evidence package before a dispute happens. No new hardware. We make money only when you do.