Contract addendums

Your suggestion implies that the playing field is even between shipper/receiver, broker and carrier. It isn't. As long as carriers are disposable, the power to negotiate will always rest with the broker/customer. Until then it is "offensive" to attempt to do so.

 

I'm over the b.s. on rc's. I try to do the same loads as much as possible. The brokers that want me to do their trash loads get a quote that makes them pay the detention up front. The last b.s. load I took from coyote had $450 of detention priced in.
Carriers are starting to have some power. You want my truck we play and pay by my rules.

 

Never take a brokers word that a customer pays detention. Get it spelled out on the RC. If the customer DOES pay detention the broker won't have a problem putting it on the RC (I wouldn't on my big building materials account). If the broker won't put it on the rate confirmation give an all in price that is high enough that you can live with it even with delays.

There IS a reason why produce loads pay what they pay. It's because they have a well deserved reputation for taking a long time to load/unload and they don't pay detention. It's unethical for a truck to take a substantially above market rate that comes with the 'no detention' tag and then threaten to bail on the load at 4pm when he's been waiting 5 hours if he doesn't get detention. In that situation I'm probably paying you the money... And never giving you another load again. You only get to screw me once. But you're losing your load at 4pm for your stupid bluff if I or the customer have an extra truck.

The above situation happens once a week during produce season. This year they mostly got away with it. In 2015/2016 they mostly got told to leave before the customer called the cops. How hard trucks are to come by is a huge part of it for sure. Let's be clear I'm not talking about people who asked for detention (if I fired all of them I'd be down a lot of trucks) but people who get a lot more aggressive and start making threats.

 

Brokers are a dime a dozen and have to be reminded that they need us a lot more than we need them.

 

Crappy brokers are a dime a dozen. So are crappy trucking companies. Good brokers and good trucking companies are not.

 

Still looking for a decent broker.

 

So they aren't a dime a dozen then?

 

Brokers yes, decent ones? Appear to be either endangered or extinct.
If I find one worthwhile I will be more than happy to sing their praises.

 

I mean you might be judging them wrong. Obviously if you're grading them on how much they overpay you the best brokers are probably screwing up all sorts of stuff.

You really don't have anyone you're working with who just usually has decent freight in your lanes that you take all the time?