Driver damaged company trailer - Canada

Hello,

This thread should be in Canadian Sub-forum but its kinda slow so I will post here.

Some of you might now this story, but I will still give a quick background.
We have a truck as an O/O with a carrier with a driver drives. This driver has many years of experience, and he pulls a customers trailer. There was snow on top of the trailer which the driver wanted to remove. He went underneath the trailer, the clearance for the tractor was fine but because there was a little snow underneath, the trailer went up hitting the top to the scraper.

Here are some more facts about this case.

- The scraper was in the customer yard.
- There was snow under the scraper which caused the trailer to shift up.
- The carrier did not keep us in loop when getting the work done I could have saved around 2k getting the same work done. I was surprised with the invoice today.
- The trailer was almost new so they changed the whole roof when they could have just pulled the roof out.
- I don't know whose responsibility is it to clean snow under the scraper.
- We have about $2700cad as a hold back with the carrier.
- I don't care if we loose the work and the driver doesnt care either.

Now, I know this is a business expense but paying $6500cad without doing any investigation to try to save some money is foolish.

What are some options I have?
Do you want pictures of the damage?

Thank you

 

MrEd Post: Did I understand correctly? Your driver drove under a device built for the purpose of removing snow build up from top of the trailer? Yes Did the customer build it to use for this purpose with their trailers? Yes Is it on their property? Yes, there was a lot of snow on the end of the trailer. If so, they should know that the ground under the device has to be kept clear to work properly and prevent equipment damage. If I am correct, then I'd offer to split the bill with them. If they refuse, tell them to take it out of your final settlement and say good bye. Their property, trailer, and snow removal device....that they didnt maintain in a usable condition....their baby to raise. I'd only offer to pay half because your driver should have noticed the built up snow, and passed on using the device until the built up snow was cleared. And who pays the other half?

Now we run under company A's authority and A's customer is a large store chain. We haul their trailer. The total bill has started to be deducted on installements from our bi-weekly pay.

Now they will say, your driver shouldnt have went underneath if their was snow on the ground. But rhe snow wasnt even much.

My driver says "when he pulled the trailer brakes, the trailer moved forward and it hit the scraper.

 

Anyone else with input?

 

Yes, he had permission to driber under it since there was so much snow on it

 

Deductible is $5k

The carrier did not keep us in loop. The got it fixed and gave us the bill.