Do all food distributors take forever to unload

I had a food distributor load once . ONCE !!

 

Yes the sacred Comcheck which they will sell you for a modest $5.00 should you be out.

 

I do not do food DC's anymore but you should. Someone has to.

I got tricked in to one the other day. I took the load to get home and asked if they had lumpers. Broker said no. I foolishly took it. I get there and they unload me BEFORE they give me a lumper invoice. Weird. I call broker and she says she had no idea they had lumpers but 'would've never told me they do or don't', a lie. She should know.

So, the broker won't give me a Comcheck auth. code, I do not have $255 cash, they won't take my company check and the security guard tells me last time they dealt with this broker the driver had to go to the ATM and get cash. No ATM anywhere close and I'm not doing that anyway. Eventually, this broker's company gives me a Comcheck advance. Never again, CVS, never again.

 

We do a lot split mostly from or between food producers, cold storage warehouses, food service companies, and a few grocery DCs every now and then. I’d say most times spent at dock would probably average near 1.5 hours. 3.5 hours being the max and maybe only a few times a year. 95 out of 100 loads are temperature controlled. Virtually all is by appointment. Make your appointments and you’ll have few problems. Broker loads also are extremely rare. This may have a lot to do with minimal BS.

I spent more time at docks in previous lives pulling dry van. Loads here average 1,500 miles for me. Point is, temp control is not bad at some outfits. Not bad at all. In fact yesterday I did another fairly common occurrence here ... unloaded and reloaded in about 1 hour, same dock, between lengthy runs.

 

When I do local sometimes, my company sends me to this huge grocery Warehouse notorious for taking hours. Had one of our drivers sit for 28 hours at one warehouse, I've sat for 16 hours at another. Not too sure what the hell they do back there but I'd love to know. Usually reefer loads tend to take the longest. 3 hours is the bare minimum for us.

 

I run flatbed. The whole idea of lumpers just baffles me. Why on earth would someone who ordered product have the carrier pay for the product they ordered to be unloaded? This simply does not happen in flatbed. I have never had to pay anyone to be unloaded. To me this would be like getting a package delivered by FedEx and the delivery guy paying me to open my package. It makes no sense!

 

This has been explained before in other threads so I’m not going to rehash it except to say there’s little comparison between flatbed loads and mixed product loads/pallets to grocers [because that’s the way the supplier palletized and loaded it] where there is a separate bin for every sku, as well as quality control. But it’s a pass-through cost that their customers ultimately pay for so if they don’t have a problem with it, I fail to see why you should. If it’s really a problem for you then I’d suggest you grocery shop at Walmart since they no longer assess lumper charges.

 

It is not a problem for me. I just don't understand why it is that way. I'm not going to stop going somewhere just because they use lumpers to unload their product. It just seems to me to be crazy for a receiver to have to be paid to unload their product that they ordered.

 

The funny thing is I have NEVER paid a LOADING fee!

 

By the way, when I was pulling a refer I never “negotiated” a lumper fee. If that broker had a problem with it, tough. Just give me the Comcheck P.O. number and I will be on my way.