The WORST Shippers and Receivers - Truckers WILL NOT Buy Their Products!

Last March, my employer had me go to a warehouse on (Route 104?) in Williamson, NY to pick up from a Mott's (Dr. Pepper Snapple?) facility.

I had a pickup appointment for 1800. As I was doing my pre-trip, I noticed that someone had damaged the front bumper of my tractor on my days off. So I had to write it up and hunt down a manager to sign off, stating that they'd inspected my tractor to see that it was damaged before I left with it. So that delayed me about 20 minutes leaving for my scheduled pickup.

According to GPS, I should have been fine. GPS was estimating arrival right at 1800. Unfortunately, it was an unseasonably warm day for March. I had to pass through a few small towns to get to Mott's, and school children were all out playing in the streets because of the good weather. So that further delayed me in getting to Mott's.

I pulled into the Mott's parking lot at 1805, five minutes late. By the time I got parked and walked into the building, it was 1808, and I was technically EIGHT MINUTES late for my 1800 pickup appointment.

At the time, I wasn't acting as a for-hire carrier. My employer was buying product from Mott's, and had sent me to pick it up. When I checked into the shipping office at Mott's, I was told I'd have to wait for a while for a dock, because they were all in use. So even though I'd arrived late, Mott's was not waiting for me, I WAS WAITING FOR MOTT'S. There wasn't a door open for me to back into until 1825.

In other words, if I'd arrived early for my pickup appointment, I still would have been waiting until 1825 for a dock to open up.

Anyway, I backed up to the dock that Mott's asked me to, at 1825. I was hungry, so I ate the lunch my wife had packed for me. Sometime after 1900, I'd finished eating and was a little sleepy. So I crawled back into the bunk to take a short power nap, figuring I'd rest for about 15 minutes or so.

I woke up at 0100 the next day. What woke me up is that Mott's had finally started loading me. Now I had a problem, as I was supposed to meet another driver (to swap trailers) early that morning, about 350 miles away.

At the time, I thought it was just a normal loading delay. STUFF happens. I wasn't happy about it, but didn't raise a stink about it because well, complaining wouldn't get me on the road any faster.

But when dispatch finally came in that morning, I had to call dispatch so that they could swap some loads around to get the Mott's load delivered (to one of our other facilities), as I couldn't meet the driver I was supposed to meet, at the time and place I was supposed to meet him. At that time, the dispatcher informed me that the reason I was running several hours late is that I had arrived A FEW MINUTES late for my scheduled pickup time.

I later heard this story from other dispatchers and drivers. Apparently, it is SOP at Mott's in Williamson to make you wait for many hours on the dock, when your load has already been picked, if you arrive even one second late for your scheduled pickup time.

I haven't been back to Mott's, would never go back to Mott's, and I'm not alone. Many drivers at my company feel the same way. They refuse to go to Mott's in Williamson, NY.

What makes the behavior so outrageous (besides the obvious) is that when I showed up there, I was a customer of Mott's. I wasn't a for-hire carrier picking up for someone else, my employer was buying the product... and my employer (THE CUSTOMER) was greatly inconvenienced by an artificially created loading delay.

 

astro-turf????..why would they wet down astro turf?????...astro turf is fake, no need to wet it down!!!!

 

I get paid $10 an hour with a minimum pay of 4 hours, even if it takes 30 minutes to do it. Or so my handbook says. My handbook is written for OTR drivers and im not OTR...heh...

I've never made more than $9 per hour working in a warehouse...

 

I rarely post but I thought it was about time. I agree that most (if not all) food warehouses/DC's are a "big time suck" and have no regard for the drivers time, log, pay, etc. We show up on time for our appointment, usually in the wee hours and then SITTTTTTTTT locked into a dock. Half a day is blown away by the time we are unloaded.

Detention pay for those who get it is more or less an insult and the shipping/receiving office usually refuses to make a note of the delay. The typical game is that they start the unload within 2 hours but that could mean only one pallet, then nothing for hours. Yet another game.

Paying a lumper is a scam at best and the Whse/DC uses them as a way around directly hiring employees. This overall situation won't change until the carrier steps up and either demands efficient in/out times or makes a real effort to charge them detention fees, etc. We all know this won't happen because customers are too hard to find and retain, so the driver takes it, again.

All I can say is I'm thankful I rarely have to go into one of these hell holes but when I do, I know my log (and miles) for the day are waisted.

Some freight is better than no freight............right ?

 

Safeway warehouse in Tracy, CA. I loaded a load of wood chips north of Kalispell Montana, was told by the shipper that they wanted the load really really bad. It was friday afternoon. I asked them if I had it there 0700 monday if they could unload me then and there.

The shipper called his contact at the warehouse, they said it sounded great to them because they were completly out, and to bring them on and that I could count on getting unloaded then.

So I did what I told them id do. I was also prudent enough to ask if lumpers were going to be required. They told me no, that the unload would be handled by safeway.

I was sitting at thier gate at 06:30, I had another load that I was scheduled to pick up in the bay area at 1:00pm.

I go up to the guard shack, and the guard looks at me kind of funny and tells me they arent unloading trucks there until after 6 pm after safeway has loaded all thier trucks, and that even at that I would have to schedule an appointment.

So I call the shipper, they call thier guy, he doesnt respond. Then I get told first appointment that they have is at 9:30 pm. that is waiting for close to 15 hours to get unloaded.

So I get stuck waiting. and waiting and waiting, but wait theres more! they tell me I cant wait there. So I go back to the J in Stockton, I wait, and I wait and I wait, Finally at 9:00 I roll up to the gate.

I go inside the guard shack, check in. They let me pull into the inside waiting parking.

and I wait, I wait I wait, I wait, and finally at 10:30 I get sick of waiting and walk back to the guard shack. They tell me that I will just have to wait. I tell them I have been here waiting to get unloaded since 06:30 this morning, if they dont have me on a dock in the next 10 minutes I am going to use my pallot jack and a chain to unload them in thier driveway, and I walk back to my truck.

Ten minutes later I walk back into the guard shack. The guard tells me again that I am going to have to wait, I walk back to the truck, I pop the back doors open, I start dragging my chain out of the tool box. I climb up to the front of my trailer and lift the pallot jack up on top of the bales of wood chips and start dragging it towards the back of the trailer when the guards flashlight shines up in my trailer, he is in a panic to stop me and tells me they have a door opening up for me.

So I stop, and I wait, with him standing there next to me, the call comes over the radio, I go bump the dock. I get inside, Walk up to the clerk inside the little glass box office, they tell me that I will need a company check to pay for the trailer to be unloaded or cash.

I tell them that I have been waiting all day, I have been jacked around all day, and that ill be ###### if I am giving them a dime to unload a load they ordered that I was told I was not going to need a lumper on.

And she tells me that I can just sit and wait until I feel like paying it. I tell her I will unload it myself, they tell me they do not have a pallot jack I can use, I tell them I have my own.

Next problem, I get over, start running the first pallot down, and because the trailer I am running is a spring ride, it is sitting low with the load in the back, and I actually have to pull the 2500 lb pallot up hill. Needless to say it wasnt happening.

I go back over to the window, it is now getting close to 1 am, I tell them there dock is too tall, it is going to take a forklift to unload the trailer, and that a pallot jack will not work to unload the trailer.

The woman snydely looks at me and tells me with a company check for I think it was like 120.00 they could unload me. Allthough I am not sure on the ammount. I again told her I was not paying a dime, and that because of the ramp I couldnt get the pallots out into thier building, but I can do it in thier parking lot because they will roll right out the back door.

She pushed my button, I walked out to the truck, fired it up, pulled forward, tipped the first pallot out the back, and oh man did they come running.

Needless to say they unloaded my trailer with out me paying for it, and we came to a mutual agreement that id never come back to safeway.

it was one of the last loads I ever pulled with a van, I went to flat beds shortly after.

 

Either you were there eons ago, or things have changed drastically in the last 8 months. I've been there probably a dozen times over the last few years. They have their own scale (they have to weigh the logging trucks that come in and out so they get paid accordingly). I've never seen a wet load, we usually deliver rolls of the material they use for the basis of the turf mats. Swift and Werner do a lot of dedicated for them. There is also a scale back down the road in Cortez at the truckstop and several in Farmington, NM.

 

AW you make me laugh!!!! you can't expect anyone to belive that or claim of 500,000 in a trk and trl.

 

As soon as i get my PA system i'm going to start treating people the exact same way they treat me. After I have the PA system, i really dont need this job. If they treat me like crap, I'll treat them like crap right back. If they blow up in my face like the guard at C&S, I'll blow up in his face. Infact, I almost did, but I'm a professional. I wasnt sure if i should punch him in the face or cry. LOL know the feelin? If they get me fired, F it. Know what i mean? But if they (like most of my customers) treat me decently, I'll treat them decently. If they're nice like all the people I dealt with at Office Max, I'll be nice.


And that reminds me...

OFFICE MAX stores....great experience. DC in Hazelton, PA was nice too but the loaders are idiots. Pallets were stacked higher than the dock doors, pallets in trailer sideways but stores no longer had forklifts, etc. But the store people were really nice so I helped them unload it for free. Taking boxes off the top and putting them on carts, etc. One was a very cute girl who gave me a COOKIE. OMFG. MM. Lol, after we unloaded she pulled out a bag of cookies from her purse and i was joking around, hovered over her rubbing my stomach...got..."Want one? Here you go!" heh. Let me go to their bathroom too.

 

Temple Inland in Mt Jewett,PA.Plan on taking your 10 hr break there,regardless of when you get there or appt time!

 

please dont work for freightmax out of washington dc,25 cents mile,pay tolls and scales,worse equipment in the world,they want you to run 4000 miles a week,my truck doors didnt open on the inside,bad tires on al trailrers and trucks i had water leaking in my bunk, i blew 2 tires in my 2 weeks there,and they dont want to pay me my money i return the truck with there permission i didnt do anything to ruin my career but quit this very unsafe outfit