Analysis of road freight transport is hindered by the lack of direct observations of the handling factor. The handling factor is the frequency of lifts of the tonnes in the supply chain from origin to destination. It also is the number of times that the same tonnes are reported to the central statistical office. Changes in the tonnes lifted figure may be caused by changes in the actual tonnes in transport or by changes in the handling factor, in unknown proportions. An econometric technique can be used to estimate what has not been observed and, thus, to recover the hidden variables of both the handling factor and the tonnes in transport.