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How to Set Zone-Based Hook-Up Fees

A hook-up down the street is not the same job as a hook-up at mile 15. Zone-based hook-up fees let you charge for that without turning every call into a negotiation. Here is a sample card, the math for a one-truck and a five-truck shop, and how the AI quotes it live.

By the Tow Deputy team · Updated September 10, 2026 · 7 min read

Zone-based hook-up fees are distance rings around your yard, each with its own hook-up amount — for example $50 inside 10 miles and $100 at 15 miles. Tow Deputy's Zone-Based Pricing checks which ring the pickup falls in and quotes that hook-up automatically, stacked with per-mile and surcharges. You edit the rings in the dashboard. The caller hears one number. You stop giving away deadhead.

Key takeaways

Zones are hook-up rings around HQ, not a replacement for per-mile.
A workable starter card: in-town, mid, and edge — then night and vehicle surcharges on top.
Worked quotes below use $2.50/mi plus zones; change the numbers to yours.
The Smart Pricing Engine quotes the whole card live; zones are one input.

A sample zone card you can steal and then edit

These figures are a teaching example, not Tow Deputy's prices and not a recommendation for your market. The product example on our site is the $50 / 10 mile and $100 / 15 mile pattern. Expand it so a dispatcher can see the shape.

Zone	Distance from yard	Hook-up fee	Why it exists
A — in town	0–10 miles	$50	Volume work; you want the phone to say yes
B — mid	10–15 miles	$100	Deadhead starts to matter
C — edge	15–25 miles	$175	You will go, but not at in-town money
Outside C	> 25 miles	Decline, or quote as long-distance with a deposit	Protects the night you only have one truck

On top of the hook-up, set per-mile from HQ to pickup (and to drop-off if that is how you bill), vehicle-class surcharges, night hours, and accident/ditch premiums. Zone-based pricing is the ring. The rest of the card lives in the Smart Pricing Engine.

Worked quotes: one truck at 2 AM, five trucks at rush hour

Assume $2.50 per mile from HQ to pickup, a $40 night surcharge after 7 PM, and a $50 AWD/flatbed surcharge. Pickup is 12 miles out — Zone B, $100 hook-up. Miles: 12 × $2.50 = $30.

One-truck owner-operator, 2:10 AM, AWD SUV in a ditch, 12 miles out. Hook-up $100 + mileage $30 + night $40 + AWD $50 + ditch premium if you charged one. Even without the ditch line, the caller hears $220, not “we'll have to see.” If you had billed a $50 in-town hook-up on this job, you donated $50 plus the extra minutes of empty drive.
Five-truck fleet, 5:30 PM, FWD sedan, 4 miles out, no night fee. Zone A $50 + $10 mileage = $60 plus whatever roadside-vs-tow distinction you set. The zone did not overcharge the in-town caller. That is the point of rings: the 4-mile job and the 12-mile job stop paying the same hook-up.

If the 12-mile job is also long-distance to a drop-off two counties away, that is when Growth-plan deposits belong on the card — a percentage, or deposit-only on long-distance — so you do not roll for a no-show. Zones handle distance to the pickup. Deposits handle whether the caller is real.

How to set the rings without overthinking it

Start with last month's jobs. Sort by distance from the yard. Find the distance where you started resenting the hook-up fee. That is the first ring boundary. The second boundary is where you almost said no. Everything past that is a decline, a long-distance policy, or a “call the owner” escalation. Two hours with a spreadsheet beats six months of “we should really start charging more out that way.”

Then load the rings in Tow Deputy and call your own line — or the demo at (615) 205-9369 after setup — with a pickup in each zone. Listen for the number. If the quote does not match the card, fix the card, not the driver. Live quoting only helps if the card is true. AI towing dispatch is what speaks the card; Starter at $99/mo includes that quoting. Zone setup is a dashboard job, not a programming job.

One-truck and five-truck ways to draw the same map

A one-truck operator should draw rings around the yard they actually sleep near, not around a “service area” they advertised in 2019. If you will not take a 25-mile hook at 3 AM because you would then be out of position for the in-town lockout that pays the rent, Zone C should decline or require a deposit, not whisper a cheap yes. Put the night surcharge on a clock you keep — if your nights start at 7 PM, the AI should start at 7 PM. A $50 in-town hook-up that ignores the night fee trains callers to wait until dark and still pay daytime money.

A five-truck shop covering two counties often needs a second center point, or at least an honest admission that trucks staging on the south side make “10 miles from HQ” a lie. Until native mapping-to-nearest-truck quoting exists the way you might want it, keep HQ as the zone origin and use driver judgment for which unit rolls. The AI's job is to quote the card and capture the pin. Closest-truck assignment is still your routing — Eric A.'s point about structured data feeding routing, not about the voice picking a unit by itself. If south-county hooks always need a higher ring, make that a zone, not a speech the night driver gives at the bumper.

Revisit the card after 30 days of transcripts. If Zone B jobs are all declining after the quote, B is too high or your market is shopping a $50 in-town competitor. If Zone A jobs are all no-shows on long drop-offs, that is a deposit problem, not a zone problem. Separate those knobs. Zones price distance to pickup. Mileage prices distance driven. Deposits price whether the caller is real. Night fees price the clock. Mix them up and you will “fix” the wrong line for a month.

Mistakes that show up on the bumper

Using zones but forgetting night surcharge, so 2 AM in-town still pays daytime money. Setting Zone C so high that you never win the edge jobs you actually wanted. Measuring “miles” as map miles when you meant loaded miles. Quoting a range on the phone while the card is exact. Publishing an online quote that does not include the AWD surcharge the driver will add at the scene. Pick one card. Let the AI read it. Argue with the card on Tuesday afternoon, not with a caller on a shoulder.

Zone-based hook-up fee FAQs

What is a zone-based hook-up fee in towing?

It is a hook-up rate that changes with distance from your yard. Example: $50 inside 10 miles, $100 at 15 miles. The AI checks which zone the pickup falls in and quotes that hook-up on top of your per-mile rate and surcharges. You are not discounting in-town work. You are stopping out-of-town work from paying in-town money.

Does zone pricing replace per-mile charges?

No. Zones stack with per-mile and with vehicle, night, and issue surcharges. A common pattern is a higher hook-up once the truck is committed to a longer deadhead, plus mileage on top. If you only use per-mile, long empty drives still underpay the hook. If you only use a huge flat hook-up, in-town callers hang up.

How many zones should a small shop start with?

Two or three. In-town, mid, and edge-of-service is enough for a one-truck operator. A five-truck shop covering two counties may add a fourth “we'll go, but it's a special” ring, or refuse that ring in policy and let the AI decline. More than five zones is usually a card nobody can remember on a noisy call — which is fine, because the AI remembers it.

Can callers see zone prices before they call?

Tow Deputy includes a public instant-quote form link if you want customers to self-quote online. Whether you publish it is a business choice. Some shops prefer the number only on the phone so they can still collect a deposit and confirm drivetrain. Either way, the live quote on the call should match the card, or you will argue at the bumper.

Put your zones on the card the AI actually reads

Start a 14-day free trial, load hook-up zones in the dashboard, then call the demo line and listen to the quote.

Start a 14-day free trial Call the demo: (615) 205-9369