IFTA Mileage Records

Who This Applies To

• Carriers that need trip-level mileage support by state or province.
• Dispatch, accounting, and safety teams comparing GPS, ELD, odometer, and routing records.
• Owner-operators preparing quarterly mileage summaries from dispatch paperwork.

What To Verify

• Whether your records show actual route miles by jurisdiction rather than only origin-to-destination totals.
• How border crossings, detours, deadhead miles, and personal conveyance are captured.
• Whether electronic records can be exported in a readable format for the audit period.
• Whether odometer readings, GPS pings, or trip sheets explain gaps between dispatched miles and reported miles.

Step-by-Step Overview

1. Start with trip records, not the quarterly summary. Each trip should show dates, unit, route, origin, destination, and jurisdiction miles.
2. Compare electronic mileage to odometer or hubometer readings where available.
3. Flag unusual jumps, missing states, or round-number entries before the return is prepared.
4. Summarize total miles by jurisdiction only after trip-level records are complete.
5. Store the summary with the underlying trips so the quarterly number can be traced backward.

Common Mistakes

• Reporting dispatched miles while ignoring actual detours or out-of-route miles.
• Using map estimates when GPS or odometer records show materially different travel.
• Combining all trucks into one mileage total without unit-level support.
• Fixing mileage only at filing time, when driver details are harder to reconstruct.