Financing transportation sits where two bodies of law meet. A factor’s or lender’s rights in a freight receivable come from secured transactions law under Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code: the security interest and its perfection, the notice of assignment, and the account debtor’s duty to pay the assignee. Whether that receivable is actually collectible depends on transportation law and practice: who brokered the load, whether the carrier had operating authority, what the rate confirmation and bill of lading show, how the broker pays its carriers, and whether the load was double brokered.

Jencks Law, P.C. works at that intersection, from the financier’s side of the table. We represent factors, banks, asset-based lenders and equipment finance companies that fund motor carriers, freight brokers and logistics companies. Representing transportation factors nationwide is a large segment of our practice, and David has worked with over 50 transportation factors.

We know the business as well as the law. David served as lead instructor of the IFA’s Successful Transportation Factoring Training Class (2005–2023), has been co-general counsel to the International Factoring Association since January 2024, teaches Secured Transactions at the University of South Dakota School of Law, and wrote the firm’s Transportation Factoring Operations Manual (2022).

Three ways we help

1. Drafting the documents

Documents built for freight, not borrowed from general commercial lending:

• Factoring and financing agreements for motor carriers, freight brokers and logistics companies
• Notices of assignment, notifications of assignment and letters of release
• Verification forms and procedures
• Operational forms: new-client underwriting and due diligence, invoice submittal, fuel advance requests, reserve and over-advance provisions
• Validity and personal guaranties, company resolutions and UCC financing statement language
• Workout, buyout and transition agreements when a relationship changes or ends

2. Operational issues

Advice on the day-to-day questions where law and operations meet:

• Verifications: pre-verification, post-verification and invoice auditing, and what a verification does and does not establish
• Broker and carrier payment practices, including quick pay, payment by check and payments made to the carrier directly after a notice of assignment
• Notice of assignment and payment-redirect risk: altered or fraudulent letters of release, bank-account change requests and hacked email
• Broker surety bonds (BMC-84) and what they do and do not cover
• Carrier operating authority, identity and double-brokering risk
• Onboarding and underwriting of carriers and brokers, including competing UCC filings, merchant cash advance positions, name changes and successor entities
• Reserves, chargebacks, over-advances and fuel advances
• Collections, from standard procedures to advanced collections and workouts

3. Litigating the disputes

When a receivable goes unpaid or the money goes to the wrong place:

• Detrimental reliance, estoppel and misrepresentation claims arising from broker and account debtor verifications
• Complex collections against brokers and shippers, including payment-over-notice claims under UCC § 9-406
• Fraud recovery: double factoring, hacked email and notice-of-assignment redirects, and identity and authority fraud
• Priority disputes with other factors, lenders and MCA funders claiming the same receivables
• Claims against broker surety bonds
• Enforcement of factoring agreements and validity and personal guaranties
• Disputes in carrier and broker bankruptcies, including preference claims, cash collateral and claims to receivables

Representing carriers, brokers or logistics companies?

For motor carriers, freight brokers, freight forwarders and logistics companies themselves, see Transportation Law.

Industry involvement

• Co-general counsel to the International Factoring Association since January 2024
• Transportation Factoring session presenter at the IFA Annual Conference and lead moderator and presenter at the IFA Transportation Meeting, 2006 through 2026
• Quarterly “Transportation Minute” column for the IFA E-Mag
• Member, Transportation Lawyers Association, and Delta Nu Alpha

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