Shady People and Double Brokering

anymore satisfied if the agent can speak good enough English for me to understand him

 

Happened to Me a few yrs back. While at home I started getting calls from brokers looking for my Driver. I explained 1 Truck outfit been home all week. Then a call from a broker who knows Me. Apparently they were trying to get a fuel advance on a load they claimed to have picked up.I don’t allow fuel advances ever in a contract.A few minutes later a Broker calls. I explained situation and said I hope you didn’t give them a fuel advance. He replies yes $1000 then quickly hung up.Made a police report they traced # to a Chicago burner phone. Apparently it’s the oldest trick in the book, very common.

 

I would try sourcing more carriers who run those lanes, then you don't have to rely as much on the unknown guys. I'm not sure how you book loads but maybe try and be more selective. You can always take a number and call back if you have to.

 

This is a dangerous situation for you. Even someone like myself who is just a "Drivah" in this situation would know instantly there is a big problem with the caller.

I am assuming you never heard from this person until that call that day and know nothing about that particular outfit or... fooled into thinking they are CH Robinson or something by the caller who is not a broker at all.

I know this is a older thread. But I find it really bad and untrustworthy to understand that people are "Piggybacking" with a telephone and probably just enough information from Google to BS their way to checks coming to them in the mail. Essentially a scammer playing with legit trucking companies and so on.

My thought should be this. If you are a trucking company or are in charge of any number of trucks, drivers etc and someone makes a call that you think has issues, don't do business with that person at all. If the caller is claiming they delivered something you probably have not sent out yet then call shipper and reciever directly and find out for sure where that 24 pallets of widgets are at physically.

Finally but not last, this is a form of scam or fraud that is probably very damaging and dangerous. Are you in a position to be filing police reports or checking with Associations and so forth to discover the bad players and have them removed from the industry all together?

I have emptied all I think I understand about this particular subject. And offer only one other thought. One load I had CH Robinson constantly call us direct to my cell as a driving as we worked our way down to LA on 5 from Oregon. We found that to be very bad because having to pull off into a spot is not ideal to answer the cell. In addition we had satellite onboard and a dispatcher or three behind that. CH Robinson could very easily CALL THEM rather than bother us drivers.

As far as double loading a trailer like a reefer or whatever, that's very rare. It's not the same as having two or more stops loading at one shipper. It's when you have to travel to two completely different shippers to go to two completely different customers. With what is essentially a pair of pup trailer loads all going into my big trailer. Sometimes one is hazmat and the other food grade which really causes problems.

Again just a couple pennies from my end as a driver. Surely you Chiefs in charge of your indians and their horses knowing where each are going where, when, what is in there and so on would be able to detect a scam call from someone claiming something that is not true. That cannot continue or it will do alot of damage to the industry, particularly if they can get to the individual drivers who usually don't know anything and might spill the beans.

 

double brookering refers to brokers that farm out loads to other brokers to get load covered , sometimes they are decent no problem loads , sometimes they are crap. sometimes meaning slow loading and slow unloading or just a crap load i guess everyone will have a different opinion on what a crap load is ......... a tell tale sign is when a load is listed by several different brokers at several different prices . brokers and sometime shippers will book a load at a higher price and keep the load active at a lower price with a different broker and if they can get someone to take it they will cancel the higher price load ........ sometimes a hot load will be listed with several agents just to get it covered those are fine after awhile it gets easy to tell them apart ..... what x1 heavy is talking about is basically ltl loads , most of the time even if you have room the contract will be for exclusive use meaning no other frieght can be on the trailer ....... you can make some money on ltl loads but they are hard to schedule and work out the logistics, I seem to have good luck finding those on the east coast heading to the midwest or texas but I work with a couple of agents regular that I call when I find the main load and start to fill up the truck

 

then you get your plain crooks were they hack into your email to get an advance on a load ...... or they get all your load info ,pickup # ect. from your email , call shipper to see if they can pick up a day early then hire an unsuspecting trucker to pickup the load and delivers to another place where it quickly dissappears into the black market. ... the trucker has a nice signed bol and faxes it to that Chicago throw away phone and buy the time he finds out hes been had everything and everyone has dissapered ....... and this has actually been happening

 

You're not kidding. I've been scammed before also and those who double broker usually aim for fuel advances.

I think one of the best things you can do when unsure about a new carrier is ask for a reference page. A little homework can go a long way. If you have internet truckstop, I'd also run a background check. Sometimes you'll find testimony, both good and bad.

 

Brokers do double broker, but only the lazy ones who can't source trucks xD
From my experience, it's the smaller trucking companies without a brokerage license who double broker - going after fuel advances. As soon as they receive the fuel advance you get ghosted, then waste time looking for the truck who actually has your freight.