Driver Retention Calculator

What does one departed driver really cost?

Every driver who leaves takes a revenue-producing seat with them, and filling it runs through recruiting, bonuses, screening, orientation, and weeks of ramp-up. Start from a typical 350-truck fleet, replace the numbers with your own, and see the cost per departure and across a year.

Start with your numbersAll free tools
1

Fleet profile

The base numbers every other line is spread across.

Every seated truck: company trucks plus owner-operators. Leave out unseated trucks and trucks held for sale.
Every driver hired in the last 12 months, company and owner-operator. Each hire fills a departed driver’s seat, so this is your replacement count.
Average fully loaded hourly cost of the internal staff who recruit, screen, and train: wages plus benefits and payroll taxes.
$
Average total revenue per seated truck per week, linehaul plus fuel surcharge and accessorials.
$
2

The departed driver

What the seat earns, and the margin lost while it sits empty.

$1,050per driver
$91,000
$3,500
Weekly revenue × weeks unseated × contribution margin. Use revenue less the variable costs you also stop paying (fuel, driver pay, maintenance, tolls). Count from the resignation to the new driver’s first dispatch.
%
$1,050/driver
3

Recruiting & advertising

Annual program costs, divided by drivers hired.

$1,065per driver
Print, radio, billboard, job-board, and social ad spend aimed at drivers. Include agency fees and creative production. Leave out customer-facing marketing.
$
$185/driver
Cost per truck of recruiting decals or trailer wraps, material plus installation, applied across the whole fleet. Include replacements after damage or a rebrand.
$
$130/driver
Careers site hosting and development, SEO, and paid lead-generation sites that charge per lead or per click.
$
$56/driver
Recruiting phone numbers, call tracking, texting platforms, and after-hours answering services.
$
$9/driver
Applicant tracking and onboarding software: subscriptions, implementation, integrations, and depreciation on any system you bought outright.
$
$241/driver
Fully loaded pay for in-house recruiters: salary, commissions, bonuses, benefits, and payroll taxes. Pro-rate anyone who splits time with other work.
$
$296/driver
Outside recruiting agencies, CDL school placement fees, and per-hire finder fees.
$
$148/driver
4

Referral & sign-on bonuses

Bonuses paid to bring the replacement driver in.

$1,639per driver
Referral bonuses actually paid to current drivers, including staged payouts. Leave out bonuses forfeited because the hire left before the payout date.
$
$889/driver
Average sign-on bonus per new driver, including retention installments paid during the first year.
$
$750/driver
5

Screening & hiring

Oversight, interviews, and the checks every applicant goes through.

$1,282per driver
The share of recruiting and safety managers’ compensation spent overseeing hiring, pro-rated by time.
$
$315/driver
Safety and operations staff time spent reviewing applications, interviewing, and qualifying drivers: pro-rated salary and benefits.
$
$241/driver
Staff time spent on previous-employer verifications (49 CFR 391.23), MVR reviews, and reference calls done in-house.
$
$74/driver
Third-party background, criminal, and employment verification reports. Count every report ordered, hired or not.
$
$287/driver
PSP reports, Clearinghouse queries, MVRs, and DAC or similar employment-history reports. Count every query, hired or not.
$
$141/driver
Examiner time, fuel, equipment, and any third-party testing fees. Include retests.
$
$139/driver
Pre-employment DOT drug and alcohol tests and collection-site fees, including applicants who failed or never started.
$
$86/driver
6

Orientation & training

Staff time at the internal hourly rate, plus per-driver materials.

$1,381per driver
Staff hours spent delivering new-driver training and onboarding safety meetings.
$17/driver
Hours spent certifying and refreshing driver trainers and orientation instructors.
$3/driver
Hours for everyone who presents or works orientation: safety, HR, operations, maintenance, payroll, and IT.
$167/driver
Handbooks, gear, uniforms, and device setup per driver. If you pay for orientation travel, lodging, meals, or orientation wages, include them here.
$
$25/driver
Mentor or driver-trainer hours per new driver, including any trainer pay premium.
$900/driver
Hours to build each new driver qualification file (application, medical card, MVRs, road test, annual review), plus work lost or redone on files of drivers who leave.
$270/driver
7

Ramp-up productivity

A new driver runs below a seasoned driver's revenue while learning the network.

$1,400per driver
weeks
Weekly truck revenue × acclimation weeks × efficiency deficit. The example assumes a 10% deficit for 8 weeks. Fewer miles, more out-of-route, and slower load acceptance all count.
%
$1,400/driver

Peer benchmark

How your turnover cost compares

Add your results to an anonymous benchmark and see where each cost line sits against other carriers. Only the per-driver figures above and a fleet-size band are stored: no company name, contact details, or exact fleet size. Peers appear as percentiles, never individual results.

Replace the example values with your own numbers to add them to the benchmark.

How the math works

Two costs in every departure.

Filling the seat

Annual recruiting programs, salaries, and check volumes are divided by the number of drivers hired last year, so each hire carries its share. Per-driver items such as sign-on bonuses, orientation materials, mentor hours, and file compliance are counted once per hire. Ramp-up applies an efficiency deficit to weekly truck revenue for the acclimation period.

The empty seat

While a truck sits unseated it earns no revenue. The calculator counts the contribution margin on that revenue (revenue less the variable costs you also stop paying) rather than the full revenue, so the figure reflects what actually leaves the bottom line.

The annual view

Drivers hired last year stand in for drivers replaced. Multiply by the cost per departure for the annual cost of turnover, and test what keeping a share of those drivers would be worth.

FreightMath, not Emotion

See which freight keeps drivers in the seat.

FreightMath costs every load, lane, and customer in your network, so you can see which freight earns its keep and which wears out the drivers who haul it.

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