Ever charge a shipper for damage to your trailer?

It's gonna happen. It happened to me about 3 weeks after I bought my own trailer. Not the same thing but similar. They'll never pay but you could try it if you have the time and energy to pursue it. I bet the best that will happen will be that they fix the dock, which is still better than nothing.

 

A shippers yard truck backed into my nearly brand new van trailer with his fifth wheel raised up high and punched 2 holes in the sheet metal skin. They wanted to pay for a $100 patch job but I was not having any of that with a brand new trailer. At a cost of $1,100 the entire sheet metal panel was replaced and they did pay for it. I documented everything with lots of photos, got the shipper to admit their fault, and being leased to a good company where the owner had dealt with these sort of things many times over the years, he knew how to get them to pay. It was a couple of months as I recall but they sent a check.

 

When going into those types of docks, always get out and look.

 

I had damage to my flatbed from a careless forklift driver.

The shipper took photos, we swapped details - they were very squirmy when it came to paying up.

3 months later I finally got a check out of them.

 

Yes, if a shipper or reciever damage the equipment. A report is made at the location the damage occurred.
Usually let the insurance companies haggle it out.
It can take a few months to get a settlement.

 

And that my friends is the number 1 correct answer.

 

It depends on who the shipper is. If you know you will use them again, you might want to think about it. The severity of the damage also matters. Loaders/Unloaders regularly scratch my air shute and one of these days I expect someone to tear it all out. I think I won’t go after them. I carry the nails in my truck and a small step ladder to fix it myself.

 

So should that work both ways then?

If you damage their property, Should they think Twice about billing you?

 

What I am trying to get at is that you could lose a customer for attempting to claim a damage of $100. As I said before, the severity of the damage matters.