How Long Should a Business Keep Bills of Lading?

There is no single retention period for every business and every bill of lading. For an ordinary domestic, non-hazardous shipment, the federal sources reviewed for this guide do not impose one universal deadline on a shipper simply because the record is a BOL. The right deletion date is the latest date required by every rule, contract, claim, tax purpose, and legal hold that applies to that shipment.

Some records do have specific federal minimums. A hazardous-materials shipping paper generally must be kept for two years, or three years for hazardous waste, measured from acceptance by the initial carrier. A motor carrier, broker, or household-goods freight forwarder subject to 49 CFR Part 379 may have a one-year minimum for certain BOL copies. A BOL required as a Customs entry record can fall under a general five-year rule. Those periods apply to different people, records, and trigger dates, so they should not be collapsed into one company-wide answer.

Start with the rule that applies to your role

Use this table as a routing guide, not as a substitute for reviewing the cited rule and your own contracts.

Situation	Who or what the rule reaches	Federal minimum or decision rule
Hazardous waste shipping paper	Each person who provides the required shipping paper	Keep a copy or electronic image for three years after the material is accepted by the initial carrier
Other hazardous-materials shipping paper	Each person who provides the required shipping paper	Keep a copy or electronic image for two years after the material is accepted by the initial carrier
BOL copy in the Part 379 shipping-document category	A motor carrier, broker, or household-goods freight forwarder subject to Part 379, when the record fits the Appendix A category	Keep for one year from the date of the document
BOL required for a Customs entry or other covered Customs activity	A person required to maintain the record under 19 CFR Part 163	The general rule is five years from the date of entry, or five years from the activity that required the record; listed exceptions can change that period
Ordinary domestic, non-hazmat BOL held by a shipper	A shipper not covered by one of the specific recordkeeping rules above	No single federal BOL-only period appears in the sources reviewed here; retain it through the longest applicable claim, contract, tax, audit, or legal-hold need

If more than one row applies, use the longest applicable period. Part 379 expressly says its schedule does not excuse compliance with another government body’s longer requirement.

Hazmat retention is measured from carrier acceptance

The hazardous-materials rule is specific about both the record and the clock. Under 49 CFR 172.201(e), each person who provides a required hazardous-materials shipping paper must retain a copy or electronic image that is accessible at or through its principal place of business.

The minimum is:

• Three years for hazardous waste, beginning when the initial carrier accepts the material.
• Two years for all other hazardous materials, beginning when the initial carrier accepts the material.

The retained copy must include the date of acceptance by the initial carrier. For rail, vessel, or air shipments, the date on the waybill, airbill, or bill of lading may be used in place of the actual acceptance date. A generic file-creation date is therefore not always the correct retention trigger.

Do not assume that saving a rate confirmation, freight invoice, or warehouse record satisfies this rule. The regulation calls for the shipping paper itself, or an electronic image of it, and requires that it be available to an authorized government official on request.

The one-year carrier rule is not a universal shipper rule

49 CFR Part 379 applies to motor carriers and brokers, household-goods freight forwarders, and certain related joint activities. Its Appendix A lists a one-year retention period for consignors’ shipping orders, shipping tickets, copies of bills of lading, freight bills from other carriers, and similar documents furnished to the carrier for moving freight. Section 379.13 says the scheduled years run from the date of the document, not by calendar year.

That does not mean every shipper can discard every BOL after one year. The Part 379 rule is tied to covered entities and listed record categories. A shipper may still need the same document for a cargo claim, Customs recordkeeping, tax support, a customer contract, a state-law requirement, an audit, or litigation.

Part 379 also permits preservation by technology that accurately reflects the record and remains accessible in a form that can be reproduced later. Covered companies must protect retained records against destruction, deterioration, unauthorized access, modification, and data corruption. A scan is useful only if the business can retrieve an accurate copy and show which version was accepted.

Claim deadlines are not document-retention deadlines

Cargo-claim timing often gets quoted as if it were a federal BOL retention rule. It is not.

For claims governed by 49 U.S.C. 14706, a carrier may not set a period shorter than nine months for filing a claim. It also may not set a period shorter than two years for bringing a civil action, measured from the carrier’s written notice disallowing all or part of the claim. Those are minimum periods a carrier must allow, not an instruction to destroy the BOL when nine months or two years passes.

The governing bill of lading, tariff, service terms, and contract may allow longer periods or add procedural requirements. If loss, damage, shortage, delay, reclassification, or billing is disputed, keep the complete shipment file until the issue is finally resolved and any legal hold is released. A routine deletion schedule should pause when a claim, investigation, audit, or lawsuit is reasonably anticipated.

International records can create a longer clock

For a Customs-covered import, the BOL or airway bill can be evidence of the right to make entry and can be part of the required entry-record set. Under 19 CFR 163.4, the general retention rule for covered records is five years from the date of entry when the record relates to an entry, or five years from the activity that required creation of the record.

Part 163 contains exceptions, including different periods for certain informal entries, low-value entries, drawback records, and other specified records. Another Customs provision can also control when it sets a different period. Businesses handling imports should map the BOL to the specific entry and record category rather than applying the five-year general rule without checking the exceptions.

Tax support depends on what the BOL proves

A BOL is not automatically a tax record, but it can become one when it supports inventory movement, cost of goods sold, a freight expense, a deduction, or another return item. The IRS says records supporting income, deductions, or credits generally should be kept until the limitations period for the related return expires. Three years is the ordinary example, but the IRS lists circumstances with longer periods, including six years, seven years, and indefinite retention.

This is another reason not to tag every BOL with the same destruction date. Link the BOL to the transaction and tax year it supports, then use the applicable tax-record period. Before discarding a record that is no longer needed for federal tax purposes, the IRS advises checking whether insurance, creditors, or another purpose requires longer retention.

Build a retention policy that survives an audit or claim

A practical policy should calculate a deletion date shipment by shipment, even if software applies the calculation automatically.

1. Identify the business’s role. Record whether the company acted as shipper, consignee, carrier, broker, freight forwarder, importer of record, or more than one of those.
2. Classify the shipment. Flag hazardous materials, hazardous waste, imports, exports, government contracts, and any commodity or customer with special record rules.
3. Record the correct trigger dates. Keep the accepted BOL date, initial-carrier acceptance date when relevant, Customs entry date, tax year, claim date, and written claim-disallowance date as separate fields.
4. Attach every applicable period. Include federal and state requirements, customer and carrier contracts, insurance terms, tax needs, audit rules, and counsel-approved litigation periods.
5. Choose the latest eligible deletion date. A shorter rule never cancels a longer one that independently applies.
6. Override deletion for open matters. Claims, charge disputes, investigations, audits, subpoenas, and legal holds should block routine destruction.
7. Review the policy when rules or roles change. A company that begins brokering, importing, or offering hazardous materials can acquire obligations its former shipper-only policy never addressed.

The record bundle should preserve context, not just a detached PDF. Keep the tendered and accepted BOL versions, authorized corrections, delivery receipt or proof of delivery when applicable, freight invoice, classification or reweigh notices, and claim correspondence together. Use access controls, backups, and an audit trail so an old record remains trustworthy when someone finally needs it.

A safe answer for most businesses

Do not adopt “one year,” “two years,” or “seven years” merely because it sounds standard. First apply any shipment-specific federal minimum. Then retain the BOL through the longest applicable contract, claim, Customs, tax, audit, state-law, and legal-hold period. Have qualified counsel or a records professional approve the policy for the jurisdictions and freight your business actually handles.

Before the next shipment, gather the origin and destination ZIP codes, packaged dimensions and weight, handling-unit count, commodity description, freight class when known, and required accessorial services. Keep those details consistent from quote through booking and documentation.

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This guide provides general operational information, not legal, tax, Customs, hazardous-materials, or records-management advice.

Sources

• 49 CFR 172.201: Preparation and retention of hazardous-materials shipping papers - eCFR
• 49 CFR Part 379: Preservation of Records - eCFR
• 49 U.S.C. 14706: Carrier liability and minimum claim periods - U.S. House Office of the Law Revision Counsel
• 19 CFR 163.4: Customs record retention period - eCFR
• How long should I keep records? - Internal Revenue Service