I know it's been said before, but it can't be said enough. I received a lumber load yesterday (which was not suppose to arrive until the end of next week). I am in the northeast and we had a blizzard, and we were shut down for the day. Now one of my employees lives next door and called one of the supervisors in the morning when he saw the truck, and they went in to try and unload him. The storm came in too fast and they couldn't finish unloading him safely, so he had to stay and wait until today to finish unloading. Apparently the driver got there at around 2 in the morning, had the driver called when he picked-up the load we would have given him an alt number to call so we could have unloaded him and had him out prior to the storm rolling in.
It was great of you guys to get him unloaded. Kudos to you and your team. My question is... why was a load scheduled to pick up so early that didn't deliver til later NEXT WEEK that would tie up an expensive piece of equipment if you folks weren't so accommodating? I see this happen often. Loads on Monday and delivers on Friday 400 miles away. That's crazy. No way I'd load that. Maybe it's just me... my mind works outside the box.
I had a similar situation years ago. I picked up a load of grade 3 lumber at Forest City California, to be dropped at Oklahoma City. Shipper said that that customer wanted the load of snow skis and knotholes tarped. Called the customer and they couldn't understand why anyone would want to tarp a load of grade 3! It does pay to know what the customer wants.
The first problem is loading the truck to deliver one week away on 400 miles. It's SILLY. And a very wanton expensive tying up a very big amount of revenue into thousands of dollars if not over 10,000 dollars for that lost week sitting at your place after a half day 400 mile run for 5 days and nights. You are going to get that freight in 8 to 10 hours after loading. Regardless if your appointment is in the morning, 5 days hence or 3 months. Drivers generally are the very, absolute bottom of any communication structure of any outfit. You might have alt numbers etc but the driver will likely know NOTHING unless you specifically specify that person is to be given that number. Those appointment times a week at 400 miles distance is not worth the potential loss in revenue. You could offer 20,000 dollars to trucking billy bob to deliver it over one week and 400 simple miles.... to make it worth while. It's usually the opposite. You have something loaded 3000 miles and you expect it in 5 days. That's very normal. It might be there we'll find out when it does get there. And probably will punch through three storms to do it.
Ive had a couple out of Yakima for Boston Market and a few east coast cities. Apples to Atlanta west, Safeway come to mind. (Apples are the best, at that time it's 15 cents a pound in the shipper store rather than a buck 50 or whatever ...) Those are my personal favorites. It's trucking to me and does not get any better than that solo. Im not going to be messing with no 400 mile next block delivery if I can land something like that long haul. It's the best use of my time and skills.
for the most part we try to accommodate, since we plan on a lumber truck ever other week, and we have the room for about 3-4 trucks worth of lumber. We try to be understanding of load times, and under certain circumstances will arrange to unload outside of our normal delivery window, IF the driver calls in advanced. In this case we needed the lumber and if I knew he was coming I would have held up on a secondary order that I got the day before.
Keep in mind the drivers only given the business number in which a secretary answers who has 0 clue about shipping/ recieving hours or other things such as an employee living next door. (Been there done that) Granted its easy to say call the receiver but when we know of a cutoff time and know we’ll roll in after midnight and the business is only open until 5 but you can park overnight. Driver just knows they’ll have to wait. If its the same carrier that picks/delivers these loads then call the carrier and or customer and give them that info so it can be relayed/saved for future use. It matters. Case in point the bad snowstorm.
I purchased a Staples CD which contains every business number in existance within these United States once a year, and many of those good numbers end up going to people within the organization that do not give out those numbers to drivers. Ive been yelled at "Drivers do not get this number, HOW IN *&^%$ did yoU GET THIS *&^%$ Number.? It's easy. spend 10 dollars. And the quality of information availible once they calm down enough to understand they own the product in that trailer back there increases immensely. I do not rely on giggly secretaries who use landmarks. The last time I had a land mark based directions set, I ended up with make a left at the baptist church. This is in NC to the west of Raliegh roughly. There were THREE baptist churches with TWO left streets possible. I kid you not. I backed up 2 miles to the vol fire dept and asked them nicely where this outfit was. I can still hear them laughing to this day. They were nice about it though. But worth the mirth and entertainment....
My favorite is, the contact number given is a fax number. You call the broker/DM and they tell you that is the way they get through to the company and is the only number they have.
