The day to day ramblings of the LTL business.

Was it by any chance a subzero?

 

Don't think he said how she looked !

 

We have to jump through goofy hoops in Food Service to sometimes and it makes me tired sometimes but what ever. I know how people are and like to think I have a good understanding of "the human condition."

Will talk about this more next year when I make my big trip out west.

 

Just an old lady ordering something from a high end store. Apparently we are outside their service network by like.... Several states and the shipper tagged us with getting it to her.

Looking back at it, i should have just left the fridge outside the garage. Had I called my boss he would have been like "what? It won't fit in her garage? Well too f##### bad! What are you doing trying to get it into her garage anyway? Get your jack back on your trailer and get going. You are wasting company time".

 

When we bought the new fridge at our house it was in the garage and my dad and I moved it inside what a project. Installing a fridge is hard work and takes strategy if not you can damage property very easily.

 

Had a refusal today.
Duplicate delivery......of all things.
Last Tuesday, customer orders their product (for next day delivery).
I get there today with the product, a week late. The original carrier lost the skid, between their dock and our interline dock.
Customer just laughed when I got there today. With the "lost" skid. As he had the replacement boxes on the floor of his dock already.

 

I believe your sister company USF Holland here in my neck of the woods has the same policy.

 

Yesterday, I had a dock as me how I planned to pay for their lumper fee.
I hadn't laughed that hard in a long time. They didn't appreciate that. Nor did they appreciate it when I told them they could reload the 4 skids back on my trailer, or sign the bills so I could leave.
The TM got involved and suddenly it was a transfer order for another company. It wasn't even their freight. THey were just rcving it for someone else.
Sometimes you just have to chuckle.

 

On another side story....

Two weeks ago I did a residential involving a hot tub. Omg...the chick I delivered it to was FINE... I mean gorgeously hot. So she met me out front and was like "hi, I am Lisa, I know you guys are curbside only, but is there any way possible to please get it in the back? There is an alley there where you can pull into and drop it right next to where it will end up. The problem with having it upfront is that we do not have an entrance to the backyard from there, and we would have to carry the hot tub around the entire block to get it into the back".

Sure enough there was plenty of room to get in and back out. They had their own little cutout next to the alley where I drop off their tub and other cars or trucks could still pass through.

Couple of things to take away from this story.

Even though you can get away with doing the minimum and cite company rules.... Sometimes bending the rules or doing a bit extra is just the right thing to do. This lady obviously rehearsed her line cause the last thing she wanted is being stuck with this giant piece of equipment out front with no easy way to get it out back. Her request sounded more like a plea. In the line of doing residential deliveries, a driver has a lot of control and discretion that can be used or abused. But you do have this thing called "reasonable accommodation". I think it is more than right to spend an extra 5-10 minutes on a delivery if it saves your customer 30 minutes or more on having them relocate it by hand. It all goes back to the old saying how would you want to be treated if the positions were reversed.

 

What the hell is a lumper fee?!?

Edit:. Nevermind. Had to Google it. That's gotta be the stupidest thing I ever heard. Even if it isn't their own freight, they probably ordered it for the customer and are charging a 10-20% consignment fee which should be the value of the freight + shipping.

Even if they are holding it for someone else... It seems like they are double dipping by trying to deduct money out of the shipping fee.

My policy is you got 15 minutes to get your crap out of my trailer. If you don't want it, refuse it.