Ask A Dispatcher anything

If the carrier tries to blame you and/or give you a service failure for their screw-up, then I don't blame you. But if I were to give you a load, and I tell you "look I know you can't make this on time, just run it in as soon as you can". And then I call the receiver and say "this load is going to be late because the driver broke down, met a cute girl, etc," that is me covering a load and saving face for the company. Would it be better for me to say "I'm sorry, but your load is going to be 2 days late because my company's owner forced us to accept more loads than we could cover"? We both know what would be the best solution to this problem is. But that's not gonna change. So that's what I mean when I say that it's not personal. In the end, though, it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. Receivers aren't dumb. They deal with these issues dozens of times a week, and they've heard all the excuses. I've never given a driver a service failure for being late unless they disappeared into a casino and turned their phone off for 2 days...while under a load (yes, that really happened).

 

1 - If you have a receiver yelling at you about anything, then you need to let your company know. No receiver should be yelling at a driver for anything related to scheduling.

2 - 90% of the time, whoever schedules the load is not who receives the load. If they need a reason, then we give them one that won't come back and bite the entire company in the ###. The load is rescheduled, and the person in the receiving office doesn't know anything different. At your smaller outfits, they charge you a late fee, you get a money code from the company, and everybody is happy.

3 - This is a reefer company. You're gonna be sitting regardless, driver.

4 - My example was for a load that is a day or 2 late. If you're 2 hours late to your appointment because you were ####ing off in a casino, then that's on you...and the late fee comes out of your check.

I don't want to get drug off in the weeds on this, but we won't ever blame a driver to where it makes him look irresponsible. We will blame it on wx, traffic, and breakdowns. I know some companies will, but I don't. Sorry that I didn't make that clearer earlier.