How much to charge when delivering locally?

By the hour. If you charge a flat rate you're only screwing yourself on those crap/extra long days. Its trucking so you know thats bound to happen

 

Yes, by the hour. You can take a trip 10 miles down the road and it will eat the better part of half a day.

 

You charge by the load with box trucks.

First you have to figure out your operating costs, then the market and how many others are providing the same service.

by the hour puts you into the general labor end of things, if I'm being charged by the hour I want more than a delivery of something, I want labor to bring it into the place and possibly unpack it.

By the hour won't work in cities either, you can not expect a customer to pay for you being tied up in traffic when they have no control over how you route your truck, that will cause you to end a lot of customers relationships very quickly.

 

Yes, you can quote a flat rate, but you need to base that rate on a hourly price. If you are stuck in traffic, you need to be paid for that time.

 

Well you charge by load, getting stuck in traffic is your problem you can't charge a customer for that.

Do you base your truck rate on an hourly rate or by mile?

 

We run mostly local, and even though the price quoted may be a flat rate, by the mile, or hourly rate, everything is based off a hourly rate.

We regularly do 30 mile loads into Nashville. Even though it’s only 60 miles round trip, it will take half a day to do, and you normally can’t get over 2 rounds a day. You just have too much traffic and too much time loading and unloading.

Our drivers are paid hourly, and truck needs to make so much in a 10 hr day. It just makes sense to base you pricing on time instead of distance.

 

I agree with you but there is another problem, if you are starting out, you need to have more than just capacity available, you have to know your market, know your competition and also know your costs. Many of these guys starting out think that they can make a go at it by just charging what others charge or doing something that they understand - like an hourly rate.

I was running straight trucks locally in Ohio, bought a fleet that the owner had built on that segment and it wasn't worth it, the returns were horrible and the market was flat with competition coming from two large carriers, so I sold it off to one of the large carriers and walked away from it, taking the drivers with me - they are still with me and doing well.

 

I’m still trying to grasp the concept of buying a truck and having no business plan or knowledge of how to run it.