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Summary

In BidRight, pricing starts with one number: RPM — your rate per mile. RPM is your number. It doesn’t belong to a shipper or a bid — it belongs to you. It’s what your company believes a lane is worth, per mile, full stop. It doesn’t change because a customer has a different fuel surcharge program, or shorter miles, or slow payment terms. RPM is the constant. What does change is what the shipper ends up paying. BidRight takes your RPM and automatically adjusts it for the realities of each specific customer — their fuel surcharge, their mileage basis, their payment terms — to produce a Standardized RPM (S-RPM). From S-RPM, the actual rates the shipper sees (linehaul, minimum charge) calculate automatically. You think in one number. BidRight handles the rest.

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When to use this

New to pricing?

You’re pricing lanes and want to understand what you’re entering and why.

RPM to rates

You want to know how BidRight gets from your RPM to the rates a shipper sees.

Cross-customer comparison

You’re trying to compare pricing across different customers and bids.

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The concept: One number, universally comparable

Here’s the problem BidRight solves. Say you price a lane at $2.00/mile. That should mean the same thing no matter who the customer is. But in practice, it doesn’t — because customers have different fuel surcharge programs, different mileage bases, and different payment terms. A $2.00 RPM to a customer with a generous fuel surcharge and 30-day terms is very different from $2.00 to a customer who underpays fuel by 10¢ and holds your money for 120 days. BidRight makes RPM mean the same thing everywhere. Your analyst enters $2.00 — that’s the lane value. Then BidRight asks: given this specific customer’s terms, what does the shipper need to pay so that you actually net your $2.00? That answer is S-RPM. It’s usually equal to or higher than your RPM, because the adjustments compensate for what each customer’s contract and lane specifics cost you.

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How it works

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Step 1: You enter your RPM

For each lane, enter the rate per mile you believe the lane is worth. This is your internal pricing decision — informed by whatever combination of FreightMath data, historical performance, Carrier First market rates, operating ratio targets, and experience you trust.The key: this number is the same regardless of which customer you’re pricing for. If a lane from Chicago to Dallas is worth $2.15/mile to you, it’s $2.15 whether the bid is for Customer A or Customer B. RPM is your carrier-level view of lane value.Over time, this is the number your analysts memorize and track as it trends upwards. It’s the number you’ll use for AI analysis across customers. It’s the universal unit.
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Step 2: BidRight adjusts for the customer's reality

Once you’ve entered RPM, BidRight automatically calculates adjustments that account for how this specific customer’s terms differ from your baseline:
Your company has a fuel surcharge peg. Your customer has their own FSC program. If theirs is lower, you’re getting underpaid on fuel. The FSC adjustment compensates for that gap. See Fuel surcharge (FSC) for the full explanation.
Customers state their own mileage for each lane. BidRight calculates practical miles independently (via MileMaker). If the customer says a lane is 480 miles but it’s actually 510, the miles adjustment compensates for that shortfall.
Longer payment terms cost you real money. BidRight applies an upcharge based on the customer’s payment tier.
A catch-all field for anything else that affects what the shipper should pay — accessorial expectations, strategic pricing decisions, account-level considerations.
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Step 3: S-RPM = RPM + All Adjustments

BidRight sums your RPM plus all adjustments to produce the Standardized RPM (S-RPM). This is your RPM translated into what the shipper needs to pay, given their specific terms, so that you actually net the lane value you intended.
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Step 4: Shipper rates cascade automatically

From S-RPM, BidRight calculates the rates the shipper actually sees:
  • S-MIN (Shipper Minimum): Practical Miles × S-RPM, rounded down to the nearest $5
  • S-L.H. (Shipper Linehaul): Customer Miles × S-RPM, rounded down to the nearest dollar
These are the numbers that flow into your export and get submitted to the customer. You don’t need to calculate them manually.

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A real example

Say you’re pricing a lane at $2.00 RPM for two different customers:

Customer A

Fuel surcharge matches your peg, miles match practical miles, 30-day payment terms.
  • FSC Adjustment: $0.00
  • Miles Adjustment: $0.00
  • Terms Adjustment: $0.00
  • S-RPM: $2.00 — no adjustments needed, the customer’s terms are aligned with your baseline.

Customer B

FSC is 10¢ below your peg, states 480 miles on a 510-mile lane, 120-day payment terms.
  • FSC Adjustment: +$0.10 (compensates for underpaid fuel)
  • Miles Adjustment: +$0.04 (compensates for lost revenue on uncounted miles)
  • Terms Adjustment: +$0.08 (compensates for cost of float)
  • S-RPM: $2.22 — the shipper pays more because their terms cost you more. But your lane value is still $2.00.
Same RPM. Different S-RPMs. That’s the whole point.

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Why this matters

For analysts

You learn lanes in one unit — RPM. When you say “Chicago to Dallas is a $2.15 lane,” everyone on the team knows exactly what you mean, regardless of which customer’s bid you’re working.

For managers

You can sort, filter, and compare RPM across every bid in the system and get a true apples-to-apples picture of how your team is pricing the network. No mental math.

For AI and analytics

RPM becomes the foundation for pattern recognition across your entire bid history — identifying lanes where you’re consistently under- or over-priced, spotting trends, and building pricing intelligence over time.

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What to watch for

RPM is your number. S-RPM is the shipper’s number. Don’t confuse them. When evaluating whether a lane is priced well, look at RPM. When checking what the shipper will actually see, look at S-RPM, S-MIN, and S-L.H.
  • Adjustments always work in your favor. They compensate for customer terms that cost you money. S-RPM will usually be equal to or greater than RPM. Important: If the customer pays an incredible FSC, BidRight will adjust the S-RPM down, which is still in your favor — you’ll still be making the $2.00/mile you need, and you’ve got a better chance of winning because your competition may not realize the spread.
  • Two lanes with the same RPM can have very different shipper rates. That’s by design. The adjustments ensure your net economics are consistent even when customer terms vary widely.
  • You can back-solve from an OR target. Instead of typing an RPM directly, you can set a target Operating Ratio and let BidRight calculate the RPM needed to hit it. The adjustment cascade works the same either way.
Rounding is intentional. S-MIN rounds down to the nearest $5. S-L.H. rounds down to the nearest dollar. This keeps submitted rates clean and slightly conservative.

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