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September 2026
By Jeff Stagl, Managing Editor
When a rail car remains at a shipper’s facility beyond an agreed-upon time for loading or unloading, a railroad typically charges demurrage, a carrying cost or car storage fee.
Historically, it’s been a difficult-to-pinpoint charge that has led to countless demurrage and storage disputes between railroads and their customers. The disputes are troublesome to resolve since multiple and sometimes conflicting sources of rail-car information need to be reviewed to come up with a solution.
Now, RailPulse has developed a standardized framework as part of its platform that aims to address the long-standing source of friction between railroads and shippers, enabling them to spend less time sorting through conflicting rail-car records.
Set to be released Oct. 1, the framework creates a shared dataset of telemetry-based location and time data to ease the claims-resolution process and timeline. It underscores the role of shared and neutral data when addressing longstanding operational challenges, RailPulse officials say.
Formed in 2020 by a coalition of rail industry stakeholders, RailPulse is working to accelerate the adoption of GPS and telematics technologies in the North American rail industry delivered through an open-architecture rail-car telematics platform. Its platform leverages GPS and other technologies to monitor the location, condition and health of rail cars.
The coalition currently includes Bunge, CPKC, CSX, GATX Corp., Genesee & Wyoming Inc., The Greenbrier Cos., Norfolk Southern Railway, Nucor Corp., Railroad Development Corp. (RDC), TrinityRail, TTX Co., Union Pacific Railroad and Watco.
Beginning in October, RailPulse location and time data generated through certified GPS devices will serve as the definitive record for participating subscribers and member railroads when resolving certain demurrage and storage charge disputes, subject to limited exceptions.
While each railroad will continue to bill accessorial charges under its own process, RailPulse data will provide shippers more precise information when they dispute a railroad’s demurrage and storage charges, RailPulse officials say.
The new framework is a rail industry first — a common binding standard for data used in demurrage and storage charge dispute resolutions, they say.
The framework involves GPS location data from certified telemetry devices installed on subscriber rail cars and shared through the RailPulse platform. Participating railroads and shippers will use the same GPS-based location and timing data — such as car arrival, departure and dwell time — when questions arise about demurrage and storage charges.
The data can be accessed directly by all railroads and customers on a shipment’s waybill, regardless of who owns the rail car. The common source of information and shared view will help reduce confusion, improve transparency and support a more efficient dispute resolution process, RailPulse officials say.
“This is a milestone event because it’s the first time in the coalition we can get everyone to trust us and to use their data willingly,” says RailPulse General Manager David Shannon. “We have heard the question many times, ‘If I equip my cars do I have the confidence in how my data will be used, and will my data be respected and used by railroads?’ Our promise has always been to align data so users see the truths. This update provides teeth to the promise we make.”
In a legal context, part of the RailPulse subscription agreement addresses how data is used. RailPulse now is updating that agreement so it’s less about subscribers trusting the platform and more about having data usage terms in contractual language, says Shannon.
“We want to get everyone to believe in the value of telemetry, and now we have a common set of truths. They all see data the same operationally,” he says. “This helps tamp down some ill will built up over the years.”
RailPulse officials also believe the framework will help incentivize others to become subscribers. Currently, more than 75 companies subscribe and the platform has more than 1,000 users, including four Class Is and more than 200 short lines.
Subscribers/users include short-line owner Anacostia Rail Holdings LLC, shippers Nucor and POET LLC, and rail-car lessor Modern Rail Capital.
Nucor doesn’t deal with a significant amount of demurrage, but the new framework holds promise since demurrage and storage disputes can absorb a significant amount of time and attention for shippers before the underlying issue is even addressed, Nucor Chief Mechanical Officer Steve Skeels stresses.
“We will definitely be using the RailPulse data when our steel mills have issues in the future,” he said in an email.
Currently, 41,000 cars are equipped with telematic devices, and the total number of the devices on cars has reached 85,000, according to RailPulse. There are four certified vendors for the devices: Amsted Digital Solutions, Nexxiot, Wabtec Corp. and ZTR. Three other vendors are going through the certification process.
RailPulse continuously monitors all telemetry devices that are reporting to the platform and works with the telemetry vendors to ensure the devices are functioning correctly and delivering reliable data. Service is regularly monitored and RailPulse develops continuous-improvement plans if service-level commitments fall short.
Each day, RailPulse logs more than 2.6 million car events, and about 1.5 million events are curated and cleaned.
RailPulse also recently announced it has integrated Telegraph’s rail operating system into its telematics data to enable subscribers and users to access and operationalize the data within Telegraph’s workflow platform. Founded in 2020, Telegraph provides digital solutions to railroads, shippers, logistics service providers, terminals and rail-car leasing companies.
RailPulse and Telegraph customers now can leverage RailPulse location, health and sensor data with Telegraph’s shipment visibility, customer support, billing, demurrage management and other operational workflows within a single operating environment.
As efforts to refine and improve the platform continue, the coalition continues to refine what can be learned from the telematic devices, says RDC Chief Operating Officer Ida Posner, who serves as RailPulse’s vice chair. She joined RailPulse’s board in 2022.
“We’re getting better at car tracking and are working on it. We want to avoid how many phone calls it takes to solve an issue,” says Posner.
RDC owns Iowa Interstate Railroad LLC. About 15% of the railroad’s owned and controlled car fleet is equipped with RailPulse telematics. Additional installations will lead to 20% fleet coverage later this year.
An exciting aspect of the new framework: It’s a tangible step toward RailPulse’s overall goal of building trust in the platform, says Posner.
“We want to be the go-to thing that people trust, that provides accurate and timely information,” she says. “Rail is a service industry and we can provide a better service product for customers.”
The framework can both provide assistance in a big dispute and offer help even in a minor dispute, says Posner.
For now, RailPulse plans to build momentum for the new framework. The hope is that it serves as the next step in the platform’s vision to deliver a better overall customer experience.
“It’s like the inertia of train. It can start slowly. It’s all about getting the wheels moving,” says Shannon. “We are early in that inertia.”
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