Delta Express/Carolina Logistics

1st post, long time reader lurker. We have been with Delta Express for 10 months as a O/O.

Pay- 90% of load gross, 10% for dispatch, broker, factoring. On paper, paid 100% of load gross then deductions.
Deductions as a new O/O to this company. Most of these deductions are not explained well... murky at best.
Issued fuel card: % of the total cost of money used on EFS card for fuel, lumpers. Example: $1,200 in fuel for 1 week will be a $60 charge against your 90% of gross.
Plus a $1.00 fee for swiping the card each time.
Lumpers: each EFS Code issued comes with the $1.00 fee. Say a $200 lumper cost fee. Delta charges the O/O $5.00 admin fee just to issue the EFS code, per code request to pay lumpers.

Tags & permits: we got tags thru Delta but some O/O have said they were permitted to use their own. Some say they has their own but Delta required them to get new ones thru them
Of course, they take $100-$150 out per settlement until tags and permits are paid for plus a fee for doing it.

Insurance: insurance is fully paid by O/O, bobtail, liability, cargo etc...deposit upfront to start insurance but will take out of settlement until deposit is paid. $995 a month cargo per trailer, tractor $206, trailer is $45. Other newer trk is $350 for tractor & $60 for trailer

Escrow: $2,500 per truck, paid upfront or out of settlement at about $200 per week.

Logo/decals/Dot #'s. $150 never told of this charge.

Workmans comp: $140 a month

Trailer: use theirs for 12% of load gross or provide your own. This is a per load fee. Also, its 12% of load gross at 100%, not 12% of the 90% paid to Owner ops. Just figure 22% if you use their trailer, 10% dispatch, 12%. If you flatbed, need racks amd equipment, thats another 2-4%.

Truck must have current DOT Inspection but they inspect your truck & equipment upon arrival and there is always at least a $1,000 bill of needed repairs before you can take a load, 1st time. It now seems to be somethimg of a regular thing. They require an in-house inspection every 90 days.

Pre-Pass for scales. Not eligible because safety score is so bad. Means you must go into every open scale.

Tolls are at the expense of O/O.

May book own loads off of whatever load board or prior customer.
Weekly settlement, always paid on time.

Repair shop: is, well, you make your own opinion. They will carry some debt and then take out of settlement. They like to see 50% of bill paid when work done.
We've had repair work performed and within hours the fix broke, oil leak seal, new water hose clamp failed, never balanced new tires put on etc.. Had new brake shoes put on trailer, 4 days later a level 1 inspection. Failed, none of the brakes were within proper adjustment. Never adjusted brakes chambers after new shoes put on. Took iit y straight to TA for inspection and yes, all brakes out of adjustment so TA did yhe adjustmemr for us. Broke reefer fuel tank during pm service on trailer so had to have new tank installed and the circus continues today.

Dpf cleaner machine, Michelin tire account, 3 axel alignment machine, full diagnostic equipment etc...
Will help pay for on the road repairs but again, really like to see between 30%-50% paid by owner when repairs are done.

Dispatch is good, 24hr roadside assistance.

Small company of about 200 trucks company and O/O. Small cross docking and stoarge capacity.

The 1st 3 months was hell with paying all the fees, renting their trailer, paying back for tags, insurance etc... again, all these expenses and fees are not clear before, during, or after the hiring process. Took some time to figure out their deal. I won't say scam but sure as hell felt like it.
Undisclosed information!

Owner of Delta/Carolina. 100% absentee. Have never seen, meet, bumped into. Some corporate staff are a joke. Have asked and requested several times to have a meeting with owner, nothing.
Some corporate staff change policy and procedure, never informing O/O and therefore end up costing O/O money, time, loss of loads etc...
Some brokers we have worked with well are telling us to jump ship because of problems and Delta is on the road to being black balled for booking loads and bailing. Mostly O/O booking loads then finding a better paying load and abandoning 1st booked load. Also, cargo claims because O/O are losing freight, damaging freight, setting reefer temp wrong and spoilage.

They don't have a terminal yet so no place for a driver/Owner to be while at orientation or in for truck repairs. They are building a new facility with lounge, showers, laundry, kitchen but right now and past, zero amenities.

How we minimize expenses.
Found and lease our own trailers saving approximately $2,000 a month per trailer. Got our own fuel cards and contact brokers directly for lumper fees using Comdata or EFS code so no fees.

Communication between corporate, dispatch, shop, and Owner ops is horrible. Mostly due to 1 or 2 specific people who are in positions they are wholeheartedly unqualified to be in. Jacob, the 20 something operations manager is a complete and absolute joke. Everyone is scared of this kid. We have tried to find out his connection to the company but alas, everyone is too scared to speak. Hreat way for am absentee owner to run a company. Put an unexperienced kid in charge to scare the hell out of everyone so gjey keep their job.

Overall, we rate Delta on a scale of 1-10, a 6.

Yes, leaving sooner than later. Great experience going from company drivers at a large career into tje relm of a true leased on owner operator.

 

You don't understand because your looking for something to ##### about. Take the information or leave it.

 

We have two (2) trucks leased on. After expenses, we are taking home between 4 & 6K a week, per truck.

Part of why we wrote the post is to let people know the in's and out's of the place. Again, murky at best. Most owner ops that sign on leave within 30 days. The not disclosed costs hit hard the 1st 90 days. For us newbies with only 2 years OTR experience, this was a great Company to get things figured out and obtain everything on our own, with planning, before getting our own authority.
Yes, we would recommend but with warnings and understandings about the fees, costs, & overhead etc...
As I said, we mitigated many of the "Hidden" charges by going straight to brokers for lumper fees due, fuel cards issued under our LLC, and leased trailers.
We lease our reefers for $1,000 a month, $900 for trlr & $100 for reefer. No mileage fees and all maintenance is paid by us. Again, we are saving about $2,000 a month because we lease our own trlrs.
Another plus already mentioned but I will repeat, on paper, we are paid 100% of every load. We are on track for a 500K gross year for 2017. Very nice if one was inclined to seek additional business funding to grow a company. Our whole goal is build the business to where we don't drive any more.

We will have a 3rd truck by November.

Delta has 3 freight areas, reefer, van, stepdeck. We plan to go add stepdeck on our resume' with the addition of the 3rd truck. Won't be too long until we will have our own authority running 3 trucks, 1 stepdeck and 2 reefer.

Yes, I can say thank you Delta for being a poorly managed Company but all it did was ensure we never got comfortable about building our own company.

 

No.

Unfortunately, after browsing around this forum for a few years, whar we wanted to say doesn't fit 100% into a good company or bad thread. We choose bad because of the nondisclosed fees and charges. There are some good aspects to the company, like motivating us to mitigate expenses, get our own assets, and eventually own authority.

But overall, any company that operates on a fear basis is not a healthy place to work or lease on with.

For example, the 90 day inspection requirement was just changed for owner operators to anytime an O/O brings a truck in.
Ok, great policy, thanks for letting us know...ie had no idea of the policy change. My wife drives 1 trk and I the other. We meet at the HQ facility for minor repairs and things we know we want done and spend time together. My trk was inspected 6 weeks ago at HQ. Its now Monday, trk is on safety hold since last Thursday because of oil on the engine. Last week in Houston TX high pressure turbo oil line had a hole in it. New hose put on. But residual oil on engine so until they can verify there is no leak, safety hold.

Wifes truck had a loose mud flap, safety hold. We wanted new brake shoes and drums, new airtank release cables, and 2 new drive tires. None of the work we wanted done has been done. So here we are, sat all weekend waiting on shop to fix a loose mud flap, Safety hold. Shop manager assured us wifes trk would be ready Saturday, by 12 noon. We went there at 1400. The mechanic (who they had come in as they are closed weekends), working was fixing a motorcycle but promised our truck would be done by 2000, Saturday. Again, its now Monday morning, nothing.

Also, owner ops are only authorized, per se, to have yheir trucks and equipment worked on three days a week. Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday.

Knowledge is power and constant shift in policy a d procedure without telling anyone is another sign of a bad company.

They do allow the 90 day inspection from any facility authorized to do annual inspections but that is a new policy change. Prior, it had to be at their inhouse shop amd you were going to have something wrong.

We try to look at the positive that ok, if something is wrong, thanks for finding it so we can fix it but it gets to be a bit of a cluster screw.

Again, the ops manager is a 20 something former used cars salesman, no college, no transporataion experience, former maintenance tech at a nursing home. Now an ops manager at a 200 plus trk company? He has no idea what he doing but everyone who works there is afraid of him because he'll fire anyone for anything. Again, hard to run a good business when the owner is 100% missing and a kid uses fear and intimidation as a management tool.

Does this clarify why a bad company?

 

Excellent question. I have no idea. Both have owner ops but I was under the impression Delta was strictly O/O and Carolina has a mixture of Company & O/O. There are no Delta company drivers.