How important is the role of brokers in trucking business?

Brokers are a necessary evil. If you dont desire to deal with them, by all means do as another states and call around for a few hours in Podunkville and you will appreciate being able to book a load in a matter of minutes.

 

Very true. That's why I said 'usually'. Usually the direct shippers on load boards are the cheapskates trying to save $50+ bypassing a broker.
Like you say, occasionally a decent direct shipper will post and pay good rates. Ironically because they are tired of dealing with brokers.

 

Just this morning @ 0430 i get a call from a carrier that said the grocery warehouse wants him to pay a lumper. Said someone should have told him yesterday and given him money then. He pulls a reefer and didn't know there might be a lumper? He had already taken an advance on the load also. What shipper wants to deal with that?

 

I know a shipper that generally moves 20-30 loads per day. They send out an email to all the carriers and brokers that wish to be on the email list, as well as posting on a couple load boards. The flexibility of the rate depends on how long they've been sitting on it. They openly post price they are looking to pay on loadboards as well as in the email list. Some of the brokers they use also post prices, generally 10-15% lower than the shipper rate. Otoh they may offer quick pay or advances (shipper is a 30 day from invoice no earlier payer)

i got got into a shipper not far from me from a post on DAT when I first started. Figured it'd be a place to talk to, saw the persons name and number to speak with on the board before I even had a chance to cold call them.

 

I once thought that this was not a problem when I had one truck and dealt with a few brokers. A few times I would have to chase them for a payment but most of the time I would just end up with a check after a couple reminders.

But when I got more trucks, I came to the conclusion that this is a business, and if they can't cover the load they contracted me to take, I will do what I have to do to get paid. So if they can't operate their business properly and have cash on hand to pay me when they say they will, then my only recourse is to file a claim against their bond to get paid because my business is more important than theirs.

Now to the OP's question, no it wouldn't be better for O/Os. I think we would end up with the same amount of money for the same work if we had a direct channel to shippers. The one thing why is that shippers are not dumb, some of the pretty large ones know what the rates are for the lanes and they can plan their shipments to get the best deal. Very few are clueless, so I would expect that the broker vanishes in our world, the shippers will figure out how to tell us what they expect to pay and force us back into the same situation.

 

Oy, lumpers...OSHA needs to get involved, IMO. I am a truck driver, NOT a dock worker. OSHA requires all dock operating companies to train their workers about the safety hazards present in their operation. I have NEVER received what OSHA calls "site specific training" to be legal to work on the customers dock. But it gets even more fudged...
Almost every state requires an employer have workers comp insurance, yet as a carrier, I have to "employ" a lumper to unload my truck without my workers comp underwriter approving the laborer. Contract labor, in some states, even requires that the contracting company have a contractors license to employ contract labor. Yet, time and time again, the trucking industry is the black sheep at the expense of the driver/carrier.
Maybe I need to become a politician or a lobbyist rather than a O/O and make some changes...

 

Their are lots of companies that do this. 2 places near me are set up this way and move their stuff incredibly cheap most of the time. You put your rate in and the start at the bottom and work their way up to the more expensive carries. Another place says this is the rate and it's a take or leave kinda thing.

 

You can't just assume that shippers are stupid and don't know what trucks will roll on therefore cutting out the broker means the highway to riches. Especially with dry vans. A savvy shipper will go direct and save money. With dry vans it is always down to the cheapest price. Shippers all know this. The times I've wasted trying to get in direct on some van stuff it was the same ol, same ol not any different than the brokers, they all want something for nothing.

 

Aren't brokers similar to travel agents/stock brokers/head hunters? Look what happened to them.