Fuel Card Records and Log Fraud

Fuel card records are one of the simplest ways to test whether a truck driver’s log matches reality. A logbook may say a driver was off duty, in the sleeper berth, or parked for a required rest break. A fuel transaction may show a purchase hundreds of miles away during that same period. When that happens, the issue is not only whether the driver falsified a record. The larger question is whether the carrier had information in its own systems showing the log was impossible and failed to act on it.

Federal law makes false duty-status records a driver and carrier issue. Section 395.8 provides that no driver or motor carrier may make a false report in connection with duty status, and it also prohibits disabling, degrading, or tampering with an electronic logging device so that it does not accurately record and retain required data.¹ That matters because log fraud is not always a handwritten-log problem.

It can involve:

• False edits
• Improper personal conveyance
• Unassigned driving
• Disconnected ELDs
• Ghost drivers
• Inaccurate annotations
• A carrier’s failure to compare logs against other records

The enforcement numbers show that false logs remain a live problem. The FMCSA MCMIS 2023 national roadside inspection report lists 2,806,452 inspections, 4,705,324 total violations, and 881,947 out-of-service violations.² It also lists 58,989 violations for “False report of drivers record of duty status,” including 24,876 out-of-service violations.³ CVSA’s 2023 International Roadcheck results reported 1,392 false-log out-of-service violations, representing 26.4% of driver out-of-service violations in North America.⁴ CVSA’s 2025 International Roadcheck results reported that false logs accounted for 10% of all driver out-of-service violations.⁵

What Fuel Card Records Show

Fuel card records are powerful because they are generated outside the driver’s logbook.

WEX explains that Level III fuel card data can include vehicle ID, driver ID, odometer reading, fuel type, gallons, and other transaction-level fields that create a more detailed paper trail for fleet managers.⁶

Comdata’s fuel-control materials similarly explain that driver cards can prompt for driver ID numbers or vehicle numbers, and that when a unit number is used, reporting can show which vehicle was fueled by the driver.⁷ ExxonMobil’s fleet card reporting materials explain that drivers may be required to enter a driver or vehicle ID and current odometer reading before purchase, linking the transaction to a particular driver or vehicle and allowing fuel-economy analysis.⁸

Those data points can expose impossible timelines. If a driver’s log says he was resting in Houston, but a fuel card shows diesel purchased in Shreveport during that window, the discrepancy is not subtle. If a driver claims to have driven 200 miles, but odometer entries and gallons purchased show a much longer trip, the log needs explanation. If a card was used during a claimed sleeper-berth period, investigators will ask who used the card, which truck was fueled, whether the odometer entry matches the tractor’s ECM or ELD mileage, and whether the transaction time reflects local time at the fuel location.

Fuel data becomes stronger when paired with other records. GPS Insight explains that fuel card integration can generate reports on fuel card transactions, calculate MPG, identify non-fuel purchases, and flag activity where a specified vehicle was not present for a purchase transaction.⁹ WEX Telematics describes fuel transaction verification by comparing GPS data to the station location, including whether the vehicle was within an acceptable distance of the gas station on the same day.¹⁰ In litigation, that means fuel card records are rarely analyzed alone. They are compared against ELD data, GPS, toll records, bills of lading, dispatch notes, cell-phone location, repair records, and driver settlements.

Supporting Documents and the Carrier’s Verification Duty

Fuel records matter because federal rules require carriers to keep and use supporting documents to verify hours-of-service compliance. Section 395.11 requires drivers to submit supporting documents to the motor carrier within 13 days, and it requires motor carriers to retain supporting documents generated or received in the normal course of business for each driver for each 24-hour period.¹¹ Supporting documents must include information that links the document to the driver or unit, the date, the location, and the time when required.¹²

FMCSA’s supporting-document guidance states that motor carriers must retain up to eight supporting documents for every 24-hour period a driver is on duty, that drivers must submit RODS and supporting documents no later than 13 days after receiving them, and that carriers must retain RODS and supporting documents for six months.¹³

FMCSA also explains that supporting documents are important to verify a driver’s records of duty status and include:

• Bills of lading
• Dispatch records
• Trip records
• Expense receipts
• Electronic mobile communication records
• Payroll records
• Settlement¹⁴

The carrier’s duty is not passive. In a Federal Register notice on supporting documents, FMCSA stated that motor carriers have a duty to verify the accuracy of drivers’ hours of service and records of duty status, ensure drivers collect and submit supporting documents, and maintain those documents in a way that allows cross-reference to the RODS.¹⁵ FMCSA further explained that carriers must be able to verify times and locations for each working day on each trip, as well as mileage for each trip.¹⁶

That is the negligent supervision issue. A carrier that receives fuel card statements, settlement sheets, trip envelopes, GPS records, and ELD data cannot simply accept a log at face value when the records contradict it. The fuel card transaction may be the clue that exposes the false log. The carrier’s response to that clue is what shows whether the company had a working safety system or only collected records after the fact.

Fuel Data in the ELD Era

ELDs did not make fuel card records irrelevant. They made comparison easier. FMCSA explains that ELDs automatically record date, time, location information, engine hours, vehicle miles, and identification information for the driver, authenticated user, vehicle, and motor carrier.¹⁷ ELDs also record location at 60-minute intervals while the vehicle is in motion, when the driver powers up or shuts down the engine, when the driver changes duty status, and when the driver indicates personal use or yard moves.¹⁸

Fuel transactions can identify gaps that ELD data alone may not explain. A driver may claim personal conveyance while traveling in the direction of a load. A tractor may move while no driver is authenticated. A driver may edit duty status from driving to on-duty not driving or off duty. A fuel purchase during one of those periods gives investigators a fixed place and time to test against the ELD record.

Section 395.32 addresses non-authenticated driver logs. When a commercial motor vehicle is operated without a driver logged into the ELD, the ELD must associate that operation with an “Unidentified Driver” account.¹⁹ The motor carrier must ensure unidentified driving records are reviewed, annotated with an explanation, or assigned to the appropriate driver, and must retain unidentified driving records for at least six months.²⁰ FMCSA’s guidance states the same principle. The carrier must either annotate the record and explain why the time is unassigned or assign it to the appropriate driver.²¹

Fuel card records can help identify who should have been assigned the miles. If unidentified driving occurred between two known points, and the same driver’s card was used to fuel that tractor during the same trip, the carrier has a reason to investigate. The fuel card may not answer every question by itself, but it can make the unassigned-driving explanation harder to accept without corroboration.

How Courts Treat Fuel Records in Trucking Discovery

Courts and regulators have long recognized that receipts and transaction records can verify or contradict driver logs. In Darrell Andrews Trucking v. FMCSA, the D.C. Circuit discussed a carrier that removed toll receipts from driver-specific files and commingled them with other drivers’ receipts so they could not be used to verify hours on the road.²² FMCSA found that supporting documents include documents that can be used to verify the driver’s record of duty status, not only documents the carrier actually chose to use.²³

A.D. Transport Express involved similar recordkeeping problems. Investigators found that toll receipts were maintained in large boxes and that many could not be identified by truck or driver, which prevented standard logbook verification.²⁴ The case is useful because it shows that “we kept the receipts somewhere” is not the same as maintaining records in a form that allows meaningful verification.

Civil discovery decisions make the same point.

The court also compelled truck mileage and fuel purchase records, including driver trip records, individual mileage records, fuel purchase receipts, computer summary reports of fuel purchases, and credit card account statements for the driver and vehicle, including examples such as EFS and Comdata.²⁶

Texas cases show how fuel records are used in fatigue and log-fraud allegations. In a UV Logistics mandamus proceeding, the court noted allegations that the driver falsified logs and that the plaintiff had fuel receipts from the trip contradicting the driver’s location as documented in the logbooks.²⁷ In JNM Express v. Lozano, the court discussed testimony that company personnel verified driver logs and fuel receipts and had control over reviewing hours on the road and whether a driver could operate under the FMCSRs.²⁸

The litigation lesson is direct—fuel records are not side documents. They are often central to whether the driver’s log, the carrier’s safety review, and the company’s account of the trip can be trusted.

What Discovery Should Ask For

A fuel-card discovery request should not stop at “fuel receipts.” The goal is to obtain the full transaction history in a format that can be matched to the driver, tractor, trailer, load, ELD record, and trip timeline.

That includes transaction detail reports by:

• Driver, vehicle, and card number
• Merchant, city, and state
• Date, time, and time zone
• Gallons, fuel type, and total amount
• Odometer entry and unit number
• Driver ID and authorization code
• Invoice number
• Whether the transaction was approved, declined, reversed, or manually adjusted

The request should also include:

• Account statements and exception reports
• Fraud reports, off-hours fueling alerts, out-of-route alerts, and out-of-state purchase alerts
• Non-fuel purchase reports, fuel tax reports, and IFTA summaries
• Driver trip envelopes, settlement sheets, and dispatch records
• Bills of lading, toll transponder data, and scale tickets
• Repair receipts and hotel receipts
• Text messages, GPS records, and trailer tracking, ECM data, and ELD data exports.

FMCSA’s supporting-document guidance specifically recognizes the need to keep records that include driver or vehicle linkage, date, location, and time.²⁹

Third-party records are especially important. Fuel card processors, truck stop chains, and telematics vendors may have the transaction data even if the carrier claims its own copy is lost, incomplete, overwritten, or stored only in summary form. WEX, Comdata, GPS Insight, and ExxonMobil materials all describe systems that can connect purchases to driver IDs, vehicle IDs, odometer entries, transaction reports, GPS verification, or fuel-economy analysis.³⁰

In a crash case, the discovery timeline should usually begin before the crash trip.

The records may show a pattern of:

One false log matters. A pattern of ignored discrepancies points to supervision.

What Fuel Records Can and Cannot Prove

Fuel card data is powerful, but it is not self-executing proof.

Those possibilities do not make fuel records irrelevant. They define the questions investigators must answer.

The strongest analysis uses fuel card records as one layer of a larger reconstruction. Fuel time and location are compared to ELD duty status, ELD location, engine hours, vehicle miles, toll transponder reads, GPS pings, dispatch communications, bills of lading, cell data, photographs, driver messages, and delivery appointments. If those independent records all point in the same direction, the log becomes harder to defend.

FMCSA’s imminent hazard order against J and J Transportation illustrates how missing or unverified supporting documents can become part of a broader safety failure. FMCSA found that the carrier failed to produce complete records of duty status or supporting documents and did not maintain or could not produce supporting documents such as fuel receipts or toll receipts.³¹ FMCSA also found that the carrier had no records showing it ensured driver HOS compliance and discussed a fatal crash after which the driver was found in violation of the 11-hour and 14-hour limits.³²

The difference between an isolated mistake and log fraud is usually found in the records. A single unexplained receipt may create a question. Repeated discrepancies, missing supporting documents, unassigned driving, carrier inaction, and trip timelines that require impossible speeds can show a system that allowed false logs to continue. Fuel card records matter because they are simple, ordinary business records that can reveal what the logbook tried to hide.

Sources

• [1] Code of Federal Regulations, Title 49, Section 395.8 (Driver’s record of duty status).
• [2] Arnold & Itkin LLP, "Analysis of FMCSA Motor Carrier Management Information System (MCMIS) Inspection and Violation Data, Calendar Year 2023" (data obtained directly from FMCSA and on file with the firm; not independently accessible via public URL).
• [3] Id.
• [4] Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, 2023 International Roadcheck Results.
• [5] Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, 2025 International Roadcheck Results.
• [6] WEX Inc., Level III Data: A Fleet Manager’s Fundamental Tool.
• [7] Comdata, Understanding Card Fuel Controls.
• [8] ExxonMobil Fleet Cards, How Can Fleet Card Reporting Help?.
• [9] GPS Insight, Fuel Card Integration.
• [10] WEX Telematics, Using the Fuel Card Transactions Report.
• [11] Code of Federal Regulations, Title 49, Section 395.11 (Supporting documents).
• [12] Code of Federal Regulations, Title 49, Section 395.11 (Supporting documents).
• [13] Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, Supporting Documents (FAQ).
• [14] Id.
• [15] Federal Register, Hours of Service of Drivers; Supporting Documents, 69 Fed. Reg. 64,014 (Nov. 3, 2004).
• [16] Id.
• [17] Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, ELD Checklist – English Version.
• [18] Id.
• [19] Code of Federal Regulations, Title 49, Section 395.32 (Non-authenticated driver logs).
• [20] Id.
• [21] Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, What Must a Motor Carrier Do With Unassigned Driving Records From an Electronic Logging Device?.
• [22] Darrell Andrews Trucking, Inc. v. Fed. Motor Carrier Safety Admin., 296 F.3d 1120 (D.C. Cir. 2002).
• [23] Id.
• [24] A.D. Transp. Express, Inc. v. United States, 290 F.3d 761 (6th Cir. 2002).
• [25] Nix v. Holbrook, No. CIV.A. 5:13-02173, 2015 WL 791213 (D.S.C. Feb. 25, 2015).
• [26] Id.
• [27] In re UV Logistics, LLC, No. 12-20-00196-CV, 2021 WL 306205 (Tex. App.—Tyler Jan. 29, 2021).
• [28] JNM Express, LLC v. Lozano, 627 S.W.3d 682 (Tex. App.—Corpus Christi–Edinburg 2021), rev’d in part, 688 S.W.3d 327 (Tex. 2024).
• [29] Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, Supporting Documents (FAQ).
• [30] WEX Inc., Level III Data: A Fleet Manager’s Fundamental Tool.
• [31] Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, J and J Transportation Imminent Hazard Operations Out-of-Service Order (Feb. 25, 2016).
• [32] Id.