mercer transportation

There is plenty of flatbed freight. The closest van freight is 100 miles, and comes back to FL. Then it jumps to over200 miles

 

Trip lease sucks.
Read your blue book and you'll find answers.

 

I did. It does not tell who to talk to. I talked to Contractor Relations. They said I had to be stuck for 24 hours which I have plus some. But they said that nobody really does it. I f I find a load call the brokers so they can book it. Every load I commit to gets cancelled.

 

I am with you Gary 14 years at Fed Ex Freight I am looking at making the move in spring 2015 I will pm got a ?

 

that's what I do , head to ga.

everytime I take a fl load I am prepared to do that.

you must be within 100 miles of Valdosta then, van loads out of warner robins.

sometimes you have to find the closest load and go to it, you lose more sitting . several up here right now at Louisville switching from van to flat

 

Those guys switching will be crying in the winter when they see the difference which doesn't effect vans like flatbeds.

 

What do you do when every load you commit to is no good

 

I think this is a very big problem at mercer it causes there turnover rate but no one seems to care just hire more o/o.
force the agents to pay a fine if the loads is on the board but is not a good load . simple as it booked or lost take it off the board, it gets frustrating when this happen time after time,it caused me to take some bad loads to get to better loads that disappear . I do not who fault cordinator,Agent or broker but it sure as hell not my fault but i am the one waisting time looking at a bad load studing what it is where is going whats out of that area just to find it no good.
I jumped on a dedicated just for that reason new agent no games no favorites no holding loads for that special driver. Trust must be earned by the o/o and by the company it a two way street ,There are too many companys begging for o/o to haul cheap loads or look at ghost loads.
My own opinion is the one of the reasons to start a van division was to get o/o over to the flat by loading the load board with cheap freight and ghost loads to drive the o/o over to flat , i could very well be wrong just the way it looks from this side.

 

russelburg, that theory is a little far fetched. the van division is still a work in progress. but the deal with cancelled loads isn't unigue to the van division , it happens with the flats also.

and its not the agents or mercer that causes it. it is simply the shippers, if ya notice on the loadboard in the middle of page there is a box that many times will have CBD , that means call before dispatch. those are loads that are best described as cattle call loads, that are sent to everyone with a truck. the first outfit to get a truck , gets the load. that is until the shipper gets a call with someone that does it cheaper. then they cancel the load and simply give it to the other company to haul.

it happens, it happens to guys that have their own authority , it happens to everyone. it isn't a big conspiracy, at least it seems nowadays the story isn't that they took the load and gave it to someone who has been here longer.

the system here doesn't lend itself to favorites or holding loads, it may seem that way but its not the case.

I have loads cancel on me, it happens. but I have a few tricks to minimize it. for instance taking a load that isn't call before dispatch if possible is one way, another is after you are accepted on a load, don't wait forever to be dispatched. I give it 15 minutes and call the agent to see when it will be dispatched, if they cant dispatch in 30 minutes or assure its a good load I come off the load and look elsewhere. you can almost bet a load that doesn't get dispatched in a couple hours will get cancelled.

there are ways to minimize this if you take the time to learn the system, that does take a bit of time and patience. but the fact is taking a bad load to get to a better load is a risk, risks don't always pan out.

and I think the reason for turnover has nothing to do with a load cancelling. I would suggest looking for the thread "why do people fail at mercer, read spyder7723 post on the subject , it is dead on.

sometimes you simply have to know when to deadhead out. it gonna happen sometimes and its just the nature of the business.

 

Im sure there are held loads here and there that dont go on the board, to favorite trucks. But its very little.

Ive had five CBD loads cancel in two hours. Each time it was because someone else pulled it cheaper. Sometimes it is whoever has the closest truck. Sucks, but thats trucking.