The PLSP program: Professional Logistics Service Provider
The PLSP program is where all of our training lives. Freight broker agent training, dispatcher training, freight research, compliance and trucking company development aren't separate courses. They're all taught inside one program: Professional Logistics Service Provider. You learn it live, hands on, with a real carrier beside you, and you finish as a certified PLSP whose job is to keep the carrier alive and grow their business.
We are a carrier-first company.
A PLSP keeps the carrier alive and grows their business
Picture a man with one truck. He's a good driver. There's freight out there. And still, most small trucking companies don't make it. They don't fail on the road. They fail because nobody is handling the business underneath the truck, and nobody is helping it grow.
The main job of a Professional Logistics Service Provider is to keep the carrier alive and grow their business. Your client is the carrier: the trucking company that owns the truck and carries the risk. A PLSP doesn't just keep things the way they are. A PLSP builds that trucking company.
That means helping the carrier find better freight and putting freight research to work for them every week. It means helping them grow from one truck to more equipment, find more good drivers, and land direct shipper freight, so they're not living on whatever the load board offers today.
And it means handling the back office that keeps them open: compliance, filings, paperwork, checking every broker, and making sure the money comes in.
You'll be able to work as a freight broker agent. You'll be able to dispatch. But a PLSP is more than either one. A dispatcher passes on loads. A broker passes on rates. A Professional Logistics Service Provider builds the carrier's business.
- Keep the carrier alive
- Grow the carrier's business
- Freight research that finds better freight
- More equipment and more good drivers
- Direct shipper freight
- Compliance and the back office
One program. Every training lives inside it.
Freight broker agent training, truck dispatcher training, freight research, compliance and trucking company development aren't separate trainings you buy one at a time. They're all part of the Professional Logistics Service Provider program. Every PLSP learns it all, because a carrier needs someone who can do the whole job.
How the PLSP program runs while you're in it
Virtual live sessions every week, taught by people who do this work. Each lesson turns into something real you build and put to work with your carrier. Research and compliance come first, before anyone books a load.
Virtual live sessions every week
Real teaching, live, online, with time for your questions. You can train while you keep the job you have now.
A real carrier from the start
Early in the program you find a real carrier, an owner-operator or small fleet, and you work with them all the way through.
Something real, built every week
A market read, a shipper list, a lane sheet, a driver file, a negotiated rate. You don't just learn it. You build it.
Research and compliance first
Freight research and the rules come before the first load, so every deal you make is on solid ground.
Then the deal and growth
Dispatching, brokering, getting paid and building your client's business: more freight, more equipment, more drivers.
Certification
A written test and an assessment conversation on the real work you've done. Pass both and you're a certified Professional Logistics Service Provider.
Freight research: the heart of everything
Here's something people outside freight don't know: there is always freight. Most of it never shows up on a public load board. It moves inside brokers' networks, between people who know each other. Freight research is how you find it.
In PLSP, you learn to read a freight market the way a professional does. Where freight leaves a region and where it comes in. Which areas are busy and which go quiet, and when. Which companies ship what, and which brokers move it. You use public government data, the load board as a research tool, and real phone calls with real brokers on behalf of your carrier.
You learn to build lanes: a run out and a run back, so the truck isn't driving home empty. You learn to judge a lane by what the truck nets across the whole round trip, not by one good-looking rate.
By the end of this part, you have your own freight map for one region and one trailer type. As we say in class: when a person actually does the freight research, they find freight. Every time.
- Reading a freight market, region by region
- Finding and ranking shippers
- Building lanes out and back
- Learning which brokers hold the freight
- Rate and lane records to negotiate from
- Your own freight map, built by you
The 12 rules of the perfect load
Before a PLSP books any load, it has to pass twelve questions. We teach them in this order, every time.
- Time. Does the driver have the hours to run this load legally, starting from where they are on the clock right now?
- Money. What does the truck actually make after what it costs to run? The other eleven rules all come back to this one.
- Direction. Where does this load leave the truck, and is there freight coming out of there?
- Distance. The paid miles, plus the empty miles it takes to get to the pickup.
- Schedule. Is there a set appointment or is it first come, first served, and what time of day?
- Availability. Is this freight every week, or just this once?
- Waiting time. Is this dock known for holding trucks for hours?
- Handling. Does the driver have to touch or unload the freight?
- Unloading fees. Is there a fee to unload at the dock, and who pays it up front?
- Getting paid. Will the factoring company buy this invoice so the carrier gets paid fast?
- Safe. Can this driver, in this equipment, run this load safely?
- Paperwork. Does the rate confirmation say exactly what the person on the phone said?
Know who's real before a load moves
Freight fraud is real, and it hits small carriers hardest. A PLSP learns to stop it at the door.
You learn to check a carrier in about ten minutes using FMCSA's own public systems: whether its authority is active, whether its insurance is on file, and what its safety record shows. You learn the five checks for a broker, cheapest first: its authority, its $75,000 bond or trust, its credit and how fast it pays, the agreement, and whether the person on the phone is really who they say they are. As we teach it: hauling for a broker you haven't checked is working for free.
You learn what fraud looks like in real life: double brokering (when a load is secretly handed off to someone else), carriers that change names to hide a bad record, stolen identities, fake rate confirmations and advance scams. And you learn the four gates every deal passes before anyone signs: identity, authority, insurance and documents.
When a carrier is wronged anyway, we show them FreightBrokerComplaint.com, our free complaint service for carriers.
- Checking a carrier's authority, insurance and safety record
- The five checks for every broker
- Double brokering and stolen identities
- Fake rate confirmations and advance scams
- Four gates before anyone signs
- What drivers must have on file
Compliance: keeping the carrier legal and open
Compliance is a fancy word for following the rules that keep a trucking company allowed to operate. Miss one and a truck can be shut down. A PLSP learns those rules and where they're written, so the carrier never gets caught off guard.
You learn the difference between authority being granted and authority being active. You learn to read an insurance certificate line by line. You learn the yearly filing calendar every carrier lives by: Unified Carrier Registration, the MCS-150 update, apportioned plates (IRP), fuel tax (IFTA) and the heavy vehicle use tax (Form 2290). One missed filing can stop a plate, and a stopped plate stops the truck.
You build a complete driver qualification file yourself, and learn what happens in a new entrant safety audit and how a carrier gets through one. You learn the records a broker must keep for three years, what's in a lease when an owner-operator leases on to a carrier, and how freight claims work when a load is damaged.
In PLSP, compliance isn't one week. It's the backbone of every week, and every answer has to come with the rule it's based on.
- Authority and insurance filings
- The yearly filing calendar
- Driver qualification files
- New entrant safety audits
- Broker recordkeeping
- Leases and freight claims
The deal: dispatching, brokering, getting paid and building your client's business
Once the research and compliance are in place, you learn to put freight on a truck, money in the carrier's account, and growth in their business. A Professional Logistics Service Provider builds their client's business, and the client is the carrier.
- What a deal really is. Not one load, but a kept agreement between people that brings the next load and the one after it. Keep your word, keep your deal, freight gets moved.
- Dispatch fundamentals. The dispatcher works for the carrier. You learn the dispatch agreement, the daily routine, check calls and closing out every load. See dispatcher training.
- Setting up your first carrier. The carrier packet, factoring set up before the first load, the truck's real cost per mile, and the first week planned around the driver's home time.
- Booking a load. When to post the truck and when to search for loads, what to say on the call, the questions to ask, and how to state your number once and stop talking.
- Negotiating. Bringing your records to the call, asking for more than just the rate (empty miles, waiting time, unloading fees, quick pay), and knowing when to walk away.
- The rate confirmation. Reading the written agreement for a load clause by clause. If it isn't on the rate confirmation, it doesn't exist.
- Getting authority the right way. When to work as a dispatcher, when to work as an agent under a brokerage, and when to get your own authority. A license is not a business. Your service is.
- Factoring and cash flow. How a carrier gets paid fast, how to compare factoring companies, and what to watch in the contract.
- Freight claims. What to do when freight is damaged or short, the paperwork at the dock, and walking a claim through to the end.
- Building your client's business. A PLSP doesn't keep the carrier where they are. You help them grow: steadier freight, better lanes and a plan for what comes next.
- Direct shipper freight. Finding the companies that ship freight in the carrier's lanes and building relationships so the carrier isn't living on the load board.
- Growing the equipment. When and how to add a second truck, and how to make sure the first one is making money before you do.
- Finding more drivers. What good drivers need, what must be on file before they drive, and how to build a team the carrier can grow with.
Keeping the carrier alive while you grow it
Growth only works if the carrier survives it. You learn the ten threats that kill small trucking companies, in the order they usually hit, and how to watch for each one every week while you build.
- Cash flow. Slow-paying brokers, no factoring and no fuel card.
- The bad load. Empty miles, hours lost at the dock and freight that leaves the truck stranded.
- A compliance lapse. A missed filing or lapsed insurance that shuts the truck down.
- Fraud. Fake brokers, double brokering and stolen identities.
- The breakdown and the repair bill.
- The driver problem.
- The insurance increase.
- Rates falling in a slow market.
- Growing too fast. Adding a second truck before the first one is making money.
- The owner who stops looking at the numbers. Cost per mile against revenue per mile, days to get paid, empty miles and the cash reserve, checked every week.
How you earn your PLSP certification
A PLSP certification means something because it isn't handed out. You earn it in two steps, and both have to be passed.
First, a written test on everything in the program: the industry, freight research, compliance, the deal and building carriers.
Second, an assessment conversation. This isn't a quiz. You walk through the real work you've done, one step at a time: your market research and freight map, a rate you negotiated with a real broker and the rate confirmation it produced, how you set up and dispatch a carrier, and your plan to keep a trucking company alive for its next 90 days. Compliance comes up at every step, and every answer has to come with the rule behind it.
The question behind the whole assessment is simple: would we hand this person a carrier? A carrier who works with a PLSP is trusting them with everything: their authority, their insurance, their driver and their cash. The certificate tells that carrier, and every brokerage in our network, that you were trained on all of it and showed it.
That's why the PLSP certification is the door into a freight brokerage. Qualified graduates are offered job placement as a freight agent with a brokerage in the LFS network.
- A written test on the whole program
- An assessment conversation on your real work
- Research, brokering, dispatch and carrier building
- Compliance checked at every step
- One certificate, one profession
- Job placement for qualified graduates
Carrier first. Not just a freight broker agent.
Everything in PLSP comes back to one question: does this keep the trucking company alive and help it grow? A PLSP is a carrier-first person. The carrier is the client. If something is good for a broker relationship and bad for the carrier, it's wrong.
A license is not a business. Your service is. We're a carrier-first company, and our graduates carry that with them into every brokerage, every dispatch desk and every trucking company they help build.
Become a Professional Logistics Service Provider
Tell us about yourself and what you want to do in freight. We read every application and call you personally to talk about the program, the schedule and the next start date.
We are a carrier-first company.
Prefer the phone? Call 901-205-9679.
Questions about the PLSP program
What is the PLSP program?
The PLSP program is our core training program: Professional Logistics Service Provider. Freight broker agent training, dispatcher training, freight research, compliance and trucking company development are all taught inside it, live and hands on. You finish with a PLSP certification through Freight University.
What is a Professional Logistics Service Provider?
A Professional Logistics Service Provider keeps the carrier alive and grows their business. That means freight research, finding better freight and direct shipper freight, growing the equipment, finding more drivers, and handling the back office and compliance. A PLSP can work as a freight broker agent or a dispatcher, but the client is always the carrier.
How does the PLSP program run?
The program runs about three months, with virtual live sessions every week, so you can train while you keep your current job. Each lesson turns into something real you build with your carrier.
Do I need logistics experience to start?
You can start with no logistics experience. Every term is explained in plain words, and the program builds from how freight moves to booking and dispatching real loads. Drivers, owner-operators and people with some freight background are welcome too.
Is the training hands on?
Yes. Early in the program you find a real carrier and carry them through the program. You research real lanes, call real brokers, check real carriers and brokers, negotiate a real rate and build a real driver qualification file, with our team beside you.
What does a PLSP learn about freight research?
You learn to read a freight market, find shippers, learn which brokers hold the freight, build lanes out and back, keep rate and lane records, and build your own freight map for one region and one trailer type. Freight research is the heart of everything a PLSP does.
How do I earn the PLSP certification?
You complete the program, pass a written test, and pass an assessment conversation where you walk through the real work you've done: your research, a rate you negotiated, how you dispatch a carrier and your plan to keep a trucking company alive and growing.
Why do brokerages accept PLSP graduates?
Most brokerages won't take a new agent without experience and a book of business. A PLSP graduate has been trained on everything a brokerage needs and has already worked real freight with real carriers. Qualified graduates are offered job placement as a freight agent with a brokerage in the LFS network.
Does PLSP teach dispatching and brokering?
Both, and more. Freight broker agent training and dispatcher training aren't separate courses. They're both inside the PLSP program, along with freight research, compliance and building trucking companies. See dispatcher training and freight broker agent training.
Is a PLSP certification a broker license?
No. The PLSP certification is a training certificate from Freight University. A broker license, called operating authority, comes from FMCSA. As an agent, you work under a brokerage's authority. And as we always say: a license is not a business. Your service is.
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