If the robot is beginning to leave Base and one of the team members touches it, then there would almost never be any penalties.
Rule 31--Touch Penalty
--there is no Game Penalty on the robot if any part of it is "in" Base
--any Cargo that the robot took out of Base with it will be returned to Base
--only if the robot happened to encounter a new piece of Cargo that was outside of Base when the robot was in Base would there be a loss of Cargo due to the touch. (I have never seen this happen in 100s of matches.)