For owner-operators
DOT compliance for owner-operators, handled for $99 a month
- Your new-entrant audit clock is running and the checklist is written in regulator-speak.
- Your mailbox fills with official-looking letters from companies that are not the government.
- Every renewal lives in your head, while you are running 2,500 miles a week.
- You are the employer of one CDL driver: yourself. The employer duties still apply.
What $99 a month covers for one truck
Deadline monitoring with 60/30/7-day alerts
Driver qualification files for every driver
Drug & alcohol program set up and run for you
Clearinghouse registration and queries
Medical card, inspection and MVR tracking
UCR, every MCS-150 and BOC-3 prepared
IFTA quarterly returns on the annual plan
Audit-ready records vault
Safety-score watch with DataQs triage
A person reviews every filing
$99/month is the annual plan for one truck, billed $1,188 up front, about two months free against $119 month to month. Each additional truck is $59/month ($69 month to month), every driver included, up to six trucks. Cancel any month; remaining full months refunded.
What DOT compliance requires of an owner-operator
Under your own authority you owe what any motor carrier owes; there is no one-truck version of the rules. The six areas are set out in what DOT compliance requires. For an owner-operator they come down to this:
- A qualification file on yourself, with the annual MVR review you perform on your own record: your own driver qualification file.
- A random testing pool you cannot run alone, a consortium named as your C/TPA, and the Clearinghouse queries on yourself: the drug and alcohol program for owner-operators.
- The filings: the MCS-150 every 24 months, UCR every year, the BOC-3 kept on file, and IFTA every quarter once you are IFTA-licensed.
- The truck: its annual inspection, and the maintenance records behind it.
The owner-operator DOT compliance checklist lists every item with its rule and its date, free.
The two that trip up most new authorities have guides of their own: Clearinghouse registration for owner-operators and how a drug consortium for owner-operators works. Running a pickup and trailer, or a box truck? The hotshot trucking requirements and the non-CDL box truck requirements show which of these apply at your weight.
Why an owner-operator specifically
Sam Bhullar drove a truck and ran this same paperwork himself, so the design starts from a fact most compliance companies talk around: nobody pays a driver to file. Every hour you spend on a form is an hour that did not earn.
Former over-the-road driver and law enforcement professional specializing in traffic enforcement, combining firsthand trucking experience with real-world insight into roadside enforcement and regulatory compliance. That is why the vault is organized the way it is: not to look tidy in an app, but so one truck’s records can be produced, complete and in order, by whoever is holding the phone.
TenFour is a private compliance-support service, not a government agency and not a law firm. Nothing about the founder’s background changes how anyone is treated at a roadside stop. It changes how well you are prepared for one. Read the full story →
A team truck is one truck
You and your co-driver are one truck, not two. Up to 2 drivers per truck are included, both qualification files, both places in the random testing pool, both query and medical-card schedules. The price does not move because a second person holds a CDL.
New authority? The Starter is included
On the annual plan the New Authority Starter comes with onboarding: compliance profile, BOC-3, UCR, MCS-150 review, Clearinghouse registration, consortium enrollment and a twelve-month calendar. Standalone it is $199, credited to a plan you start within 60 days.
New Entrant Audit prep is part of member onboarding too, so the audit in your first year is a file you hand over rather than a week you lose. Standalone it is $549. See new authority compliance setup, or work through the new authority checklist first.
Outside the plan. A DataQs challenge is $99 for members and we review it first, invoicing only if it is worth filing. Form 2290 is $49. Unusual work is $95 an hour, quoted before it starts. Every one of those prices is published on the pricing page.
Compare what you get, not the base price
Of the 14 providers that publish a price, 11 cost more than TenFour once you add what their price leaves out, and 3 land about the same.
TenFour comes to $1,287 a year for one truck with every driver included, counting the $99 a year consortium fee you pay directly, one company to deal with, and one thing no other row can offer: former over-the-road driver and law enforcement professional specializing in traffic enforcement, combining firsthand trucking experience with real-world insight into roadside enforcement and regulatory compliance.
TenFourOne company, one bill
Comparable annual cost$1,287
$1,188 to TenFour + $99 bought elsewhere = $1,287
Advertised: $99/month, billed annually ($119 month to month)
Included: Driver files, drug & alcohol program (consortium enrollment and every form done for you), Clearinghouse, tracking, UCR, MCS-150, BOC-3, IFTA (annual plan), vault, safety-score watch, human review, scorecard.
Still needed elsewhere: the consortium's membership fee, $99 a year for the whole account, paid to the consortium directly. We refer you, enroll you and do every form, so it is still 1 vendor to manage.
FoleyQuote only
Comparable annual costQuote required
Advertised: Quote required: the Essential, Professional and Power tiers show no prices
Included: Driver files, Clearinghouse, MVR monitoring and audit support are sold only inside the quote-only packages
Still needed elsewhere: Cannot be priced without a quote
No published price
J. J. KellerManaged service
Comparable annual cost$1,732
$594 to J. J. Keller + $1,138 bought elsewhere = $1,732
Advertised: Managed services are quote-only. DOT Authority Monitoring is published at $49.50 per month per DOT number
Included: Authority monitoring with UCR and MCS-150 filed automatically
Still needed elsewhere: Driver file $199 · Consortium $160 · Clearinghouse $199 · Expiration tracking $60 · +3 more$1,138 in all, from other companies
5 vendors to manage
$445 a year more
OOIDA Business ServicesAssociation
Comparable annual cost$1,393
$380 to OOIDA Business Services + $1,013 bought elsewhere = $1,393
Advertised: $45 a year membership, required before buying any service
Included: CMCI drug & alcohol consortium $170 a year when you are your own DER, plus a one-time enrollment fee; Clearinghouse work billed separately ($115 bundle, or $75 + $40 portal + $10 a query)
Still needed elsewhere: Driver file $199 · UCR filing $99 · MCS-150 $75 · IFTA returns $400 · +4 more$1,013 in all, from other companies
5 vendors to manage
$106 a year more
DOT Compliance GroupConsortium
Comparable annual cost$1,410
$571 to DOT Compliance Group + $839 bought elsewhere = $1,410
Advertised: $299 a year, drug & alcohol testing program
Included: Consortium enrollment and random testing management; Clearinghouse billed separately at $99 to $299 a year
Still needed elsewhere: Driver file $199 · Expiration tracking $60 · Vehicle records $60 · Audit-ready files $60 · +2 more$839 in all, from other companies
4 vendors to manage
$123 a year more
FleetDrive 360À la carte filings
Comparable annual cost$1,351
$891 to FleetDrive 360 + $460 bought elsewhere = $1,351
Advertised: $5 per driver per month for the platform
Included: Compliance software: document storage, expiration tracking, alerts
Still needed elsewhere: IFTA returns $400 · Audit-ready files $60$460 in all, from other companies
3 vendors to manage
$64 a year more
Prices read from each provider's own published pricing on September 7, 2026, for a one-truck, one-driver carrier over twelve months, setup included. “Still needed elsewhere” is priced at the median of what the providers in this table charge for that item. Government fees, drug tests and physicals are excluded everywhere, because every provider passes them through. A person to answer your questions is not priced at all, no provider in the table sells one below $199 a month. TenFour is a private compliance-support service, not a government agency and not a law firm; nothing about the founder's background changes how anyone is treated at a roadside stop. See all 16 providers, the method and every source →
Do you even need us?
- If you are leased to a carrier that runs your testing pool, keeps your driver file and makes the filings, most of this is already covered. Ask them for it in writing, and keep your money.
- If you enjoy the administration, have the calendar under control and have never missed a date, you may not need a service. Our free guides and tools are open to you either way.
- If your authority is new, if you have drivers other than yourself, or if any date currently lives only in your head, that is when this pays for itself.
Tell us what you run and we will say plainly whether TenFour is worth it for you. We would rather lose the sale than sell you something you do not need.
Owner-operator questions
Do owner-operators need a DOT compliance service?
Not always, and we would rather say so. Leased to a carrier that runs your testing pool, keeps your file and makes the filings? Most of this is already covered. Under your own authority, every obligation a carrier has is yours, from your own driver file to the random pool, and a service earns its price when your authority is new, when you add a driver, or when any date lives only in your head. The filings themselves you can always make yourself; several are free.
Do owner-operators need to register for the Clearinghouse?
Yes. Under your own authority you are the employer as well as the driver, so you register as an employer and designate a consortium/third-party administrator in your own Clearinghouse account to handle the reporting, because you cannot report on yourself. You also need a pre-employment full query on yourself before you first drive, and a query every year after that. We walk you through the registration and the designation, and track the queries.
One truck. Is $99 a month a lot?
It is about $3.30 a day on the annual plan for the whole compliance function: the driver file, the drug and alcohol program paperwork, the Clearinghouse queries, the registrations, the calendar and a person reviewing every filing. Before you compare that to a lower advertised price, compare what the price buys. A cheaper headline usually covers a narrower scope; add the consortium, the Clearinghouse setup, the UCR and MCS-150 filings and the IFTA returns you would still buy elsewhere, and the comparable cost is what matters. Our comparison page does that arithmetic from each provider's own published pricing. And if you would rather do it yourself, our guides show you how; we only want customers who can see the value.
What if I add a second truck?
Add it in your account or text us. The price moves by exactly one truck ($59 a month on the annual plan, $69 month to month) with up to 2 more drivers included. The membership runs from one truck to 6 online. Fleets of 7 or more are custom pricing, so at that size contact us and we scope it with you.
I'm leased to a carrier. Do I need TenFour?
Probably not, and we will tell you that. Running under someone else's authority, the carrier carries most of the carrier-level obligations: the testing pool, the DQ file, the filings. The time to talk to us is when you are about to get your own authority, because that is the moment all of it becomes yours.
Do you work with brand-new authorities?
New entrants are exactly who this was built for. FMCSA's new entrant program runs 18 months from registration (49 CFR 385.307), the agency's guidance is to expect the safety audit within your first 12 months of operating, and the New Authority Starter sets the whole first year up so that audit is not a scramble: profile, BOC-3, UCR, MCS-150, Clearinghouse, consortium and a twelve-month calendar.
I run team with my spouse. Is that two trucks?
No. A team truck is one truck. Every driver on the truck is included, up to 2 per truck, and both drivers get a full qualification file, a place in the testing pool and their own query and medical-card schedule at no extra charge.
What do I need to get started?
Your USDOT or MC number and ten to fifteen minutes, by text if that is easier. We pull what is public, ask for what is not, and tell you exactly what is missing before you decide anything.
Run your truck. We'll run the file cabinet.
$99 a month for the first truck on the annual plan, every driver on it included. One company, one monthly payment, one place for your compliance.
$99/month is the annual plan for one truck, billed $1,188 up front, about two months free against $119 month to month. Each additional truck is $59/month ($69 month to month), every driver included, up to six trucks. Cancel any month; remaining full months refunded.