2140-0015 Supporting Statement A - Waybill Samples 2140-0015 (to ROCIS)

2140-0015
December 2023
Expires 12/31/2023

SUPPORTING STATEMENT
FOR REQUEST OF OMB APPROVAL
UNDER THE PAPERWORK REDUCTION ACT AND 5 C.F.R. § 1320

The Surface Transportation Board (STB or Board) requests a three-year extension of
approval of the regulations governing the collection of the Waybill Sample.
A. Justification.
1. Why the collection is necessary. The Surface Transportation Board is, by statute,
responsible for the economic regulation of common carrier freight railroads and certain other
carriers operating in the United States. In this capacity, the Board often uses the information in
rail-carload waybills to carry out its responsibilities. A carload waybill is a “document or
instrument prepared from the bill of lading contract or shipper’s instructions as to the disposition
of the freight, and [is] used by the railroad(s) involved as the authority to move the shipment and
as the basis for determining the freight charges and interline settlements.” 49 C.F.R. § 1244.1(c).
From these carload waybills, the Board creates an aggregate compilation of the sampled waybills
of all reporting carriers, referred to as the Waybill Sample. The Waybill Sample is the Board’s
principal source of data about freight rail shipments. It has broad application in, among other
things, rate cases, the development of costing systems, productivity studies, exemption decisions,
and analyses of industry trends. The Board has authority to collect this information under
49 U.S.C. §§ 11144, 11145.
The information in the Waybill Sample is used by the Board, other federal agencies (the
Department of Transportation, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Agriculture, for
example), and industry stakeholders to monitor traffic flows and rate trends in the industry, and
to develop evidence in Board proceedings. The Waybill Sample is also a major source of
information for states developing state transportation plans. In addition, non-government groups
seek access to Waybill Sample data for such uses as market surveys, forecasts of rail-equipment
requirements, economic analyses and forecasts, and academic research.
2. Use of Data Collected. The Board uses this information to document the waybill
sampling rate for carriers using a computerized system of reporting and to provide a
comprehensive sampling of waybills for both the Board and other users of waybill data in a
variety of contexts (e.g., increasing the reliability of parties’ evidentiary presentations in certain
rate reasonableness proceedings), which will further the rail transportation policy goals of
49 U.S.C. § 10101. See 49 U.S.C. § 10101(2), (4), (6), (13).

3. Extent of automated information collection. Respondents report electronically.
Currently, filers submit flat text files to the Board through an STB contractor, using the FTP or MQ
protocol. The instructions for the Waybill Sample, “Procedure for Sampling Waybill Records by
Computer,” are available on the Board’s website at https://www.stb.gov/wpcontent/uploads/Waybill-Sample-Directions-Statement-81-exp-9-30-2020.pdf, and general
information about the waybill may be found at https://www.stb.gov/reports-data/waybill/.
Respondents may also contact Pedro Ramirez by phone at (202) 245-0333 or email at
[email protected] to get instructions for submitting the Waybill Sample electronically or in
paper hard copy.
4. Identification of duplication. This information is not duplicated by any other agency.
The Board is the only source of waybill information.
5. Effects on small business. The Board requires a railroad to file carload waybill data for
all line-haul revenue waybills terminated on its lines if: (a) it terminated at least 4,500 revenue
carloads in any of the three preceding years; or (b) it terminated at least 5% of the revenue
carloads terminating in any state in any of the three preceding years. 49 C.F.R. § 1244.2. In
addition, a carrier need only report quarterly (rather than monthly) if it submits computerized (rather
than paper) Waybill Samples or if it submits less than 1,000 waybills per year. Thus, the submitters
of this collection are mostly larger railroads.
6. Impact of less frequent collections. The Waybill Sample may be submitted monthly,
quarterly, or annually, depending on the size of the rail carrier required to submit waybill data.
Less frequent collection would impede the access by government regulators and private stakeholders
to timely information about the industry.
7. Special circumstances. No special circumstances apply to this collection. (Note:
Although 49 C.F.R. § 1244.6 states that railroads submitting computerized Waybill Samples are
required to retain copies of the underlying waybills for four years, that retention period conflicts with
the one-year retention period for waybills provided in § 1220.6. The agency has treated § 1220.6 as
controlling in this matter.)
8. Compliance with 5 C.F.R. § 1320.8. The Board published a 60-day notice requesting
comments on this collection at 88 Fed. Reg. 65421 (Sept. 22, 2023). No comments were
received. A 30-day notice was published concurrently with this submission to Office of
Management and Budget (OMB). 88 Fed. Reg. 88211 (December 20, 2023).
9. Payments or gifts to respondents. The Board does not provide any payment or gift to
respondents.
10. Assurance of confidentiality. The Board recognizes that some of the submitted
information is commercially sensitive, and thus the Board’s regulations place limitations on releasing
Waybill Sample data. See 49 C.F.R. § 1244.9.

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11. Justification for collection of sensitive information. No sensitive information of a
personal nature is requested.
12. Estimation of burden hours for respondents.
(1) Number of respondents: 53. The Board categorizes railroads required to report
Waybill Sample data as either quarterly or monthly and as either sampling their
own waybills or having a third party conduct their sampling. The number of
respondents for each category is set forth in Table 1 below.
Table 1 – Respondents
Categories of Respondents
Railroads that conduct their own sampling and report monthly
Railroads that conduct their own sampling and report quarterly
Railroads that have a third party sample their waybills and report
monthly
Railroads that have a third party sample their waybills and report
quarterly
Total Respondents

Number of
Respondents
5
3
2
43
53

(2) Frequency of response: Approximately Eight respondents report monthly,
quarterly, and annually; and approximately 45 reports quarterly and annually.
(3) Annual hour burden for all respondents: 420 hours. The estimated hourly burden for
waybill samples submitted to the Board varies depending on each respondent’s
particular circumstances. Respondents that are identified as reporting monthly (Class
I carriers) report monthly, quarterly, and annually (or 17 times per year). All other
respondents (non-Class I carriers) report quarterly and annually (five times a year).
This estimated total burden hours is shown in Table 2 below.
Table 2 – Total Burden Hours
Categories of Respondents Total
Annual
Hours for
Samples
Submitted
Railroads that conduct
150
their own sampling and
report monthly
Railroads that conduct
20
their own sampling and
report quarterly
Railroads that have a third
30
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party sample their
waybills and report
monthly
Railroads that have a third
220
party sample their
waybills and report
quarterly
Total Annual Burden
420
Hours
* The Board pays for the third-party contractor to prepare samples.
13. Other costs to respondents. No “non-hour cost” burdens associated with this collection
have been identified. Waybills are created by rail carriers in the normal course of business. Thus,
this collection does not require additional record keeping.
14. Estimated costs to the Board. The Board contracts out the collection of the Waybill
Sample. The annual cost of the contract is approximately $180,000 (based on a three-year average
cost). Board staff also spends time gathering, processing, and evaluating the collection of waybills
for the Waybill Sample. The estimated cost to the Board is approximately 0.1 FTEs, in addition
to the Board’s collection contract.
15. Changes in burden hours. The Board’s staff has reviewed the actual collection of
materials, and it estimates that the reporting burden will be reduced from the last extension.
16. Plans for tabulation and publication. Waybill-Sample data, aggregated at the industry
level to protect commercially sensitive information (and referred to as the Public Use Waybill
Sample), is available on the Board’s website, www.stb.gov (under Industry Data/Economic
Data/Waybill).
17. Display of expiration date for OMB approval. The expiration date appears on the
instruction document for the collection, which is posted on the Board’s website.
18. Exceptions to Certification Statement. Not applicable.

B. Collections of Information Employing Statistical Methods.
Not applicable.

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