© 2025 Rail Cost Control. All Rights Reserved.
Are your rail rates reasonable?
Rate Benchmarking: Determine Reasonable Rates for Your Movements
To determine a reasonable benchmark rate for your movement there are some characteristics about your movements that you must understand. These are what the railroad’s variable cost is for the movement, the rail profit for your move versus competitors and how your rate stacks up to competitors in the marketplace. These questions can be answered in less than 30 seconds for any movement with just a few user inputs.
Don’t just take our word for it…
Calculate railroads cost,
profit, and RVCs
Railroad’s Variable Cost and Revenue to Variable Cost Ratios (RVC) are calculated to determine the profit railroads make from your moves in relation to all captive and competitive railroad moves of your commodity.
Market Data
In order to obtain reasonable rates, you must first know what reasonable rates are for your moves. Rail Rate Checker gives you access to the largest database of rail rates that exist and not only shows competing rates for your moves, but also the volume of traffic into your markets and where traffic in your markets originates.
Rail Rate Checker then shows how rates and carloads in your markets have changed over time.
Commodities by Railroad (CBR)
The CBR has need to know information for strategic planning as it provides the business model for each commodity on each railroad. The database shows how rates have changed in relation to competitors and highlights opportunities to grow revenue for both shippers and their railroads. CBR is a must have database for effective strategic planning.
SEC Filings and Escalation
The SEC database provides the big picture for what is driving rail rates. Revenue, expense, and volume information from all Class 1 Railroads SEC filings is maintained over time and compared against inflation, trucking and railroad averages to make educated macro decisions.
Weekly Rail Carloads (WRC)
The WRC database shows how rail carloads for major commodity groups are changing in real-time. Shipper’s carloads are more important when a carrier’s volumes decrease but as a carrier’s volumes increase the reverse is true. The WRC keeps you current on the change in railroad’s volumes.
Calculate Routes and Miles for Your Movements
Rail Rate Checker gives you access to PC*Miler, the industry leading tool for determining route options and rail mileage, Trimble Maps (formerly ALK). Whether you are looking to find the best potential route for new or existing moves, verify fuel surcharge miles, or the distance to a potential transload site, the mileage calculator gives you quick easy access to the information you need on your moves.
