Heavy-Duty Repair Transparency & Fairness Act (HD-RTFA)

Legislative Overview

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Title: Heavy-Duty Repair Transparency & Fairness Act
Author: Michael Thomas, Founder of Freight University and Logistical Forwarding Solutions

Purpose: To protect America’s trucking and logistics infrastructure by establishing transparency, oversight, and ethical standards in heavy-duty

repair pricing and commercial parts sourcing.

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Section 1: National Repair Pricing Standardization

• Create a federally administered and publicly accessible database that establishes benchmark pricing for heavy-duty commercial vehicle repairs and part replacements. These benchmarks will be adjusted regionally based on labor rates, parts availability, and freight density.

• Require all participating repair shops, service centers, and dealer-affiliated locations to disclose itemized repair estimates, including labor hours, hourly rates, parts costs, sourcing origin, and markups. Pricing must fall within federally determined guidelines unless justified through exemption review.

• Mandate an annual audit process conducted by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to ensure compliance, verify invoice accuracy, and monitor systemic violations.

• Empower the FMCSA to issue warnings, fines, or temporary removal from federal procurement eligibility for shops found to be repeatedly out of compliance.

• Establish industry-wide transparency in pricing and billing practices to allow carriers, drivers, and fleet operators to make informed decisions.

• Remove inefficiencies, eliminate systemic waste, and combat fraud and abuse by enforcing objective pricing standards across the logistics repair sector.

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Section 2: Commercial Repair Oversight Task Force

• Establish a dedicated task force within the U.S. Department of Transportation tasked specifically with identifying and addressing systemic abuse in the commercial vehicle repair sector. The task force shall consist of regulatory officials, logistics policy experts, industry stakeholders, and public representatives.

• Investigate cases of excessive pricing, repeated overbilling, fraudulent diagnostic practices, and service upcharges that exceed national benchmarks.

• Coordinate with FMCSA and IRS to analyze invoicing patterns, repair trends, and financial data from participating vendors to spot predatory behavior or inflated cost structures.

• Empower the DOT to conduct unannounced field audits of commercial repair facilities, including service documentation reviews, technician labor validation, and cross-comparison of vendor invoices with standardized pricing references.

• Extend authority to include oversight of the commercial towing industry, which has increasingly been cited for predatory practices including extreme price inflation, unauthorized towing, and the effective "kidnapping" of commercial vehicles. Require tow operators servicing heavy-duty or logistics-related vehicles to submit price logs and service authorizations for audit.

• Implement a towing rate audit program that establishes acceptable service thresholds for hook fees, per-mile charges, storage rates, and administrative costs. Any operator found significantly exceeding national benchmarks without cause will be subject to penalty.

• Investigate cases where towing or recovery services are used to coerce carriers into inflated repairs, excessive storage durations, or related upsells without carrier authorization.

• Develop enforcement protocols that include warnings, fines, compliance mandates, and potential civil referrals in cases of continued abuse.

• Produce bi-annual public oversight reports identifying trends, enforcement actions taken, and regional hotspots for commercial repair fraud, overpricing, and tow-related predatory practices.

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Section 3: Verified Repair Network (VRN)

• Launch a national platform for ethical and transparent heavy-duty repair facilities.

• Offer certification, searchable listings, and promotional incentives for shops that comply with federal standards.

• Require annual re-certification and customer satisfaction benchmarks.

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Section 4: Whistleblower Protections & Reporting Mechanisms

• Launch a secure, encrypted FMCSA-hosted Repair Oversight Portal to receive confidential complaints and supporting documentation, such as invoices, service records, photos, and testimonies, from industry professionals and consumers alike. This portal shall allow anonymous submissions to encourage reporting without fear.

• Provide robust federal legal protection from retaliation—including termination, harassment, blacklisting, or civil threats—for drivers, owner-operators, carriers, and shop employees who report unethical or illegal practices such as inflated pricing, fraudulent diagnostics, parts mislabeling, forced repairs, or towing abuse.

• Designate a specialized FMCSA enforcement and intake team to review incoming reports and initiate investigation workflows based on severity and recurrence.

• Include built-in tracking for whistleblower reports, allowing voluntary follow-up while preserving anonymity.

• Establish a nationwide awareness campaign to inform truckers and logistics personnel of their rights and the tools available to safely report abuse, fraud, or overcharging.

• Require coordination with the Department of Labor and Department of Justice to offer extended protections and legal pathways for whistleblowers who become targets of retaliation.

• Introduce an annual Whistleblower Integrity Report summarizing the types and frequency of abuse reported, resolution rates, and systemic vulnerabilities identified.

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Section 5: Incentives for Independent, Ethical Shops

• Provide tax credits and grant access to small and independent repair businesses that maintain compliance with VRN standards.

• Include optional apprenticeship and job training tax relief for shops that participate in workforce development.

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Section 6: Penalties for Predatory Practices

• Authorize escalating civil penalties for any repair facilities, service chains, or towing operators found to systematically exceed federally established markup thresholds without justification. Penalties shall scale based on the frequency and severity of violations, with repeat offenders subject to suspension from participation in federally subsidized programs.

• Require public disclosure of confirmed violations via an FMCSA-maintained database, allowing carriers and fleet owners to make informed decisions when selecting repair vendors.

• Define "predatory practices" to include:

  • Inflating parts or labor charges beyond federally accepted ranges.

  • Fabricating or exaggerating diagnostic results to upsell services.

  • Charging for unauthorized work or parts not delivered.

  • Excessive storage fees following towing, without appropriate notice.

  • Bundling unrelated or non-urgent repairs into mandatory service quotes.

  • Collusion between towing companies and repair shops to hold equipment until excessive bills are paid.

• Establish a national Repair Compliance Score modeled after CSA safety ratings, to be publicly visible and regularly updated based on audits, complaints, and regulatory findings.

• Allow for the temporary or permanent delisting of shops from the Verified Repair Network and national procurement directories if found in continuous violation of fair repair practices.

• Enable coordination with state attorneys general and consumer protection agencies for criminal or civil enforcement in cases of egregious abuse.

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Section 7: Consumer & Economic Impact Review

• Commission an annual, data-driven study jointly conducted by the Department of Commerce and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to assess the national economic impact of repair fraud, inflated service costs, and towing-related price manipulation. The study shall analyze effects on the freight industry, small business solvency, consumer pricing, and overall supply chain performance.

• Utilize artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies to analyze trends across submitted invoices, audit records, whistleblower reports, pricing deviations, and regional repair benchmarks. These systems will detect anomalies, forecast potential hotspots for abuse, and identify under-regulated geographic and commercial zones.

• Integrate AI-driven analytics into the Verified Repair Network (VRN) database to enhance scoring, flag trends in overpricing, and proactively issue alerts for enforcement review.

• Include qualitative data from fleet owners, owner-operators, and repair personnel to evaluate the social and operational cost of predatory practices.

• Deliver findings in an annual "State of Repair Fairness" report to Congress, complete with visualized data, regional insights, economic projections, and policy impact recommendations for continued legislative refinement.

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Summary

The HD-RTFA is not just a repair policy—it is a national safeguard for the logistics backbone of the United States. With trucking companies collapsing at record rates, driver bankruptcies rising, and shipping costs inflating, this act offers a long-overdue solution to restore fairness and economic resilience to one of the country’s most critical sectors.

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Commercial repair fraud is not a distant or abstract problem—it is a direct driver of inflation, job loss, and consumer price increases. Predatory repair and towing practices are dismantling small fleets, bankrupting owner-operators, and accelerating the collapse of independent logistics businesses at a time when the nation needs its supply chain operating at full strength.

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We cannot afford to wait years for market self-correction or rely on voluntary ethics in a system that has incentivized exploitation. The time for legislative intervention is now. Every month delayed results in more truckers sidelined, more cargo delayed, and higher costs passed down to American households.

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The HD-RTFA provides a comprehensive framework for transparency, enforcement, AI-driven accountability, and national economic monitoring—making it the most advanced logistics protection policy introduced in over a generation.

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To protect the working-class drivers, small business fleets, and consumers across every U.S. community, Congress must act swiftly. Repair transparency is not optional—it is essential to national infrastructure security, supply chain affordability, and public economic trust.