Help, with dispatching.

Receiving hours. Size of load as you stated. Some loads are only partial or LTL, less than load. Depends on the kind of trailer you pull.
You can call the shippers direct. You don't have to use a broker. You may have a local company or two that can use your service and might like the personal attention from a small carrier.
Good luck.

 

Explain more about calling the shipper....plz. I have called and talked to shippers but they always tell me I have to go through their broker service or, they have me set up with them, and then never call me. I was pretty pro-active with one in particular but I felt as though I was wasting my time.

 

It is just that. The time invested might seem like a waste of time. When you find that one or few customers that you work together with will make it worth your effort.
A lot of potential customers may only go thru a broker. If you stay persistent and you are able to move a load when their broker can not, chances are they will call you a second time.
It may take a couple years for this to happen. Just think how the shipper feels getting call after call to gain their work. How many small outfits they may have given a chance and it backfired.
Just send a "I'm still available" email or card periodically. Emails are cheap and postcard gives the personal touch. Good Luck.

 

I am with Landstar and my wife is my load planner and dispatcher. She will call me first and we discuss the load, especially if it is even possible to do it. Then she will call the broker to find out if the load is available and verifies everything such as live load, live unload, weight, times for pickup and delivery as well as the money. If everything is good, she books the load and then stays on top of the email waiting for the details. Once that arrives she verifies that everything is correct. If it is then she sends a confirmation email since this seems to usually work best. If there is a question she will either email, or call to resolve the issue. She then stays on top of everything usually sending email updates. When the load is completed she will send a thank-you email. She keeps track of the agents and while she is still new is building a list of agents we want to continue working with. She is also very proactive in keeping the truck moving. She will give an agent about 20 minutes to get back to her about a load, but also keeps looking for what we want.

Her phone work is top notch, but then she has experience since she worked the call center for the Southern Baptist Bookstore when they still had a store in St. Louis. Her advice would be to be professional, but friendly. Take your que from the person on the other end of the phone. Some will want to chat and others will want to get done and move on. The way she answers the phone, "Hello, this is Dana, dispatcher for BCO Matthew." When she calls about a load, "Hello, I am calling about a load on the load board for a BCO."