Interstate vs. Intrastate — Who Actually Regulates Your Move

The short answer: a move that crosses a state line is interstate and federally regulated by FMCSA (the 100%/110% rule, the NCCDB complaint database). A move that begins and ends in one state is intrastate and governed by that state — with a narrow exception for moves made entirely within a single commercial zone.

Every federal moving protection on this site — the 100% / 110% delivery ceiling, the NCCDB complaint process, the hostage-load rules — applies to interstate moves. If your move was not interstate, those rules generally do not reach it, and a different agency is in charge. So this is the first filter to run.

This is general information, not legal advice, and it does not classify your particular move for you. When the answer is close, or money is riding on it, consider confirming with a licensed attorney in your state. Here is how the line is drawn.

The basic line

• Interstate move: the shipment crosses a state line — for example, from one state to another. These moves are regulated by the federal government through FMCSA.^[1]
• Intrastate move: the shipment begins and ends within the same state. These moves are regulated by that state, not by FMCSA.^[2]

FMCSA’s consumer booklet, Your Rights and Responsibilities When You Move, is written for interstate moves and lays out the federal framework that follows from crossing a state line.^[3]

How courts have treated this

The interstate / intrastate line is not only an FMCSA policy — it tracks a long-standing principle in federal case law. Courts have held that interstate moving is a federally governed subject. In Adams Express Co. v. Croninger, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the federal scheme for interstate carrier liability created a uniform national rule and displaced the patchwork of state regulation that came before it.^[5] Federal appeals courts have applied the same idea to household-goods moves: in Rini v. United Van Lines and Hoskins v. Bekins Van Lines, the courts held that the federal Carmack Amendment provides the framework for claims arising from an interstate move, and that overlapping state-law claims tied to loss or damage are generally preempted.^[6][7]

This is background on how courts see the federal-versus-state divide — general information, not a prediction about any particular move. These cases deal with loss-and-damage liability rather than the 100% / 110% delivery rule, but they illustrate the same boundary this page describes: once a move is interstate, the federal framework is what governs.

The commercial-zone edge case

Here is where the simple “crossed a state line, so it’s federal” rule breaks down. Some moves cross a state line and still are not FMCSA-regulated, because they happen entirely within a single commercial zone — roughly, one metropolitan area that spans a state border.

FMCSA’s own example is the New York City commercial zone. A move within that zone is not subject to FMCSA regulations even though it crosses a state line.^[2] Concretely, a move between, say, Brooklyn, New York and Hackensack, New Jersey can fall inside that single NYC commercial zone — so it crosses a state line on a map, yet sits outside FMCSA’s interstate household-goods rules.

Use the Coverage Checker

If you are not sure which bucket your move falls into, walk through it with the tool.

Open the Coverage Checker → It steps through the interstate / intrastate / commercial-zone questions and points you toward the right framework — federal or state — for your move. It does not decide your case; it routes you to the rules that apply.

If your move is intrastate, go to your state

When the move stayed within one state (or inside a single commercial zone), your protections and your complaint path come from the state, not FMCSA. Each state sets its own rules, and some regulate household movers far more closely than others.

Find your state’s regulator and complaint path →

If your move is interstate

If your move crosses a state line and is not confined to a single commercial zone, the federal framework applies — the 100% / 110% delivery ceiling, the documents your mover must give you, and the NCCDB complaint process. The general FMCSA consumer hub pulls these together.^[4] When something has gone wrong on an interstate move, movers scammed me — what to do lays out the ordered path.

Last reviewed: June 10, 2026