Sanitary Transportation Rule

Shippers must specify in writing to carriers the sanitary and temperature requirements for vehicles and equipment. Loaders must check vehicle condition and precooling before loading, carriers must keep vehicles clean, provide temperature data on request and train personnel, and receivers must check for temperature abuse. Written procedures, agreements and training records must be kept, generally for 12 months. Large businesses had to comply from April 2017 and small businesses from April 2018. Some businesses with under 500,000 dollars in revenue are exempt.

The sanitary transportation rule makes temperature and cleanliness on food loads a shared, documented responsibility between a warehouse and its carriers. A 3PL that loads refrigerated trailers is often the loader and sometimes the shipper of record, so it needs written procedures for pre-cooling and trailer inspection. For example, a cold storage warehouse shipping frozen meals to a grocery DC should record trailer temperature and condition before loading, keep the shipper's written temperature instructions on file, and reject a dirty or warm trailer.

• Refrigerated TrailerReeferTrailer with its own refrigeration unit
• Cold Chain ShippingShipping goods that must stay cold
• Temperature-Controlled StorageStorage kept in a set temperature range

• Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA)2011 · 2011 law shifting FDA food safety to prevention
• FSMA Food Traceability Rule2022, compliance from July 2028 · FDA traceability records rule for high-risk foods

1. FDA: FSMA Final Rule on Sanitary Transportation of Human and Animal Food fda.gov