May be even less, especially once you establish some lanes. My last renewal for 30 states, roughly east of I-35 and south of NY was $1,150 per truck. I think I still had 3 or 4 from the estimated chart so I could keep them on just in case. They were at the edge of our normal area, so the mileage was low and probably only added around $20 to the total. I expect our IRP to increase a little this coming renewal as our favored routes shifted from low tax southern states to higher tax mid Atlantic states. The updated actual miles (re-using my IFTA workbooks) I enter on the renewal application will shift that apportionment.
FL is very "generous" with their portion of the estimated miles and they aren't cheap. Something the OP HAS to do is make a trip sheet for every load with beginning and ending odometer readings for the trip. Failure to do this will allow the auditor to fine you by forfeiting your IRP fees and decreasing your IFTA MPG, resulting in fuel tax, penalties and interest from the audit period. Can you tell I learned the $8,000 way?
Just get a truck Garmin GPS. It records all miles for all states and generates a spreadsheet format at the end of every quarter
When he gets audited, he'll be audited out of the same office I was. Just trying to give him a heads up. I don't really think they'll accept that as the final word either without odometer readings. Have you been through an IRP/IFTA audit?
I downloaded Foglines Software Truking Pro software to do my accounting. The nice thing about it is every settlement carrys over your last odometer reading as your new start then you just plug in the odometer reading at the end of the trip. The report will show expenses, revenues and miles. If I add the states and routes it will track my IFTA and IRP milage so I have records of everything.
There are GPS' that have been cleared by the FMCSA to be accurate enough to use for miliage reporting. If it has that rating you can use the reports in an audit. Im sure they all track milage but only certain ones will get you through an audit.
I passed an audit in Georgia a few months ago using GPS generated IFTA reports. When I do IFTA, I pull in an export from QuickBooks with my fuel detail and do miles and fuel in the same file. The auditor accepted those spreadsheets as final, although I do keep paper receipts filed for backup. Unless FL is just more strict with it, they're really just looking for evidence of fraud, not precision. As long as your logbook trips line up with your IFTA trips, and those check out against mapping software mileage, you're good. At least that's what my auditor told me.
What I have been reading is a nationwide change. Its a more logical system and will also more fairly divide tax money...and reduce some burden on the O/O
