Letting your driver Dispatch themselves.

In 2014 when you could fall out of a truck and get a good rate this worked fine.

Now, relationships and accounts matter. People that have been doing this a long time have struggled the last 9-months as inventory levels adjusted and the markets got back into a normal cycle. Being new makes it harder since you don't have relationships or understand the markets.

Example: Nursery is shipping. But not all nursery is created equal. What sounds like a good load can turn into a loser real quick. And some of the less ethical brokers will see you coming a mile a way and slam a load on you.

You likely would be better off leasing to a carrier that dispatches a truck.

 

You want good advice?

Here is what I do.

I hire drivers and let them make their own decisions.

They are 1099/contractors for me. They know how to make money because they proved that before they got hired. I split the line haul with them, 60/40 and they get all the labor related accessorial fees. I get the FSC and pay for everything else like maintenance.

I have to trust these guys/gals to do a good job, I don't do hand holding, rarely get involved with disputes which really gets me mad at the company but when it all shakes out we all make money.

You can listen to drivers on what they want but I found out a long time ago, they are not running the company nor do they understand what goes on in the office so it is difficult to please people when there are too many opinions what's fair and what isn't. Set business up, know your expenses down to the penny, set your standards, write your policies and stick to them, this is about business not chummy relationships where you go out drinking with in the pub.

I tried different things but it came back to them getting 40% of everything - with those exceptions - and they are happy. We do not count miles unless it is needed, we work with a formula (which you will have to figure out yourself based on your business model) and this is how they decide what load to take and what they won't. Almost all the load offers for all the trucks exceed the formula minimals.

Doing all of this work is easy compared to finding the driver. I would learn how to do that more than anything else but as I mentioned setting your business up, and all of that first, then worry about the driver.

Two hard things I have to do is when I need a driver, I have to go through maybe 20 people to find one I like and feel good about but the other is that with the way the system is on licensing, I can't find a lot of people with driving experience who can do simple things like check oil easily.

Oh and one other thing, I had to learn how not to micro-manage people, I had to learn that in the IT world when I would get contractors to work on projects, so another hard thing to do is to let them do their job.

 

[Sigh]...... It's not gas. Never call it gas.

Still not understanding why you feel the need to run your own numbers with one truck while you've got three leased on and while you hold down a full time accounting gig. You already have more than you can handle and you might lose everything, including the accounting job that you desperately need to finance your trucking hobby.

Start small and KISS

 

Something else strange.... You've been at this for over two years and you still haven't figured this out?

http://www.thetruckersreport.com/truckingindustryforum/threads/unprofitable-o-o-canadian.245064/