Can some one please explain to me why most intermodal carriers rent space at drop yards ?Thank you

Rail used to give us 4-5 days before storage kicked in, now it's 2 days free for most rails, $100-$200 per day after.

 

We return the most over due containers first so our operators are directed to pull the empty from the customer to a drop yard where they get under a unit that is most overdue.

Some customers get extra free time so the 'due back' list keeps the oldest stuff going back and is why we may drop one MT for another.

Our customers are responsible for the over due charges up to 24 hours past their releasing the MT so we are always re-billing the past due amounts back BUT any one with a huge block of containers that can take months to off-load means we have a huge amount of past due fees we pay out to the steamship lines. Big dent in the cash flow; enough to give the bookkeeper grey hairs...

 

I’ve seen containers being charged more than $30,000 for storage. Customs wouldn’t release papers. But generally, containers need to be picked up from the rail within 2 days, otherwise it’s $200-300/day storage. Even though they can’t schedule delivery, most brokers will have a carrier pull the container from a rail yard to save $$. They would rather pay $200/250 for the pull, and $50-100/day storage, than let it sit at the rail and accumulate thousands of dollars of storage fees

 

We use drop lots four loads have no billing yet,and u have last free days at ramps or ports got to get it out expensive to stay ramp port.so it may not cut the load so drop it wait for good date