Lying brokers, how do you handle them?

This industry lies about everything they Brokers,Shippers,Receivers,Trucking Companies,Drivers all lie. The Government regulates HOS and all of a sudden they loose capacity? What’s the difference between electronic and paper. Ok ATM card or writing a check. Same thing in my the end. Stop lying and fooling yourself about the money

 

ELD is the result of the I’m not going to make no money unless I work 16 to 20 hrs a day 8 days a week. If truckers feel like they can’t ask for a decent wage or rate then why battle Regulations that make you safer in terms of your position with the law. You don’t have to worry about being pushed over 11/14/70. Brokers Shippers,Receivers,Carriers and Drivers need to start taking care of the Drivers. We have a career that works against our health and sometimes our families. I say we need reform in how we as a Driver deal with the business without us the trucking industry stop. Brokers lie should be double the money it’s lost revenue for that Truck. The Reform needs to come from that side of the business with the rates should be a minimum set but anyway OOIDA need to lobby for that.

 

ALWAYS get a phone number to the consignee where the product is going. if the agent doesn't provide one for you, even if they are loading the product on the truck then tell them to stick the load up their *** and put them on a do not haul list.

We've had this happen to us a couple times, and I always have them put it in writing what they are said will happen, and if the truck has to sit, they compensate it for sitting.

 

I leave. I've made shippers unload my truck and put the freight back on the dock. About 2 or 3 weeks ago I booked a load at my rate from a 3 letter mega. What I was sold when I booked the load did not jive with what the shipper told me on arrival and check in. I was expecting it to be the typical 1 or 2 hours waiting while they loaded me and make my deliveries 500 miles away in the morning.

The shipper told me my load was scheduled to pickup on 10-31-17 which was about 5 days before my arrival there. I checked in at 11 am and they told me it would be around 9pm before they could get me worked in. I told him thanks but no thanks you can keep it. I called the broker and gave him the shipping managers name telling him what was up and here is your load back.

He was actually cool about it and fully understanding. I've worked with him on plenty of good freight over the years. His freight is always good. Other agents at his company, not so much so, and this wasn't one of his. I felt like I owed him one for having my back on that one and so repaid the favor. Most times it isn't so rosy and the broker is all ticked off.

If you as a broker want to lie to cover loads be ready to deal with the consequences when someone isn't willing to put up with your bull ####

 

Had a couple of loads I was working on last week where the shipper was looking to get the product out the door, and when I found out that the receiver was either not going to be ready to receive it, or didn't want to receive it until this week, I had to call and give carriers heads up. There was a lot of scrambling going on. In a lot of these cases, at least from my perspective, I find out that my customer point of contact is being told one thing that turns out to be inaccurate. Now, I'm not going to say that there aren't lying brokers out there - God knows that the reputation exists for a reason. However, at least in our office, we try to make sure you guys have good information to go on- it makes things go so much smoother and it ensures that we keep decent relationships with customer and carrier alike.

 

I want to be clear this isn't something that happens more than 2 or 3 times in a year. I'm thorough about asking for load details before I book anything.

I reject a LOT of offers just out of hand based off what I'm being told. I know when I'm talking to someone that has a real load and customer versus some clock watching schlub that doesn't know anything about the load they're trying to cover. In the example above the load was sketchy from the get go. Normally my contact there is able to give me everything he can see on the load, who the customers are, etc.

He couldn't see any of that. Nor the 10-31-17 part either. He told me it was hot and asked if I wanted to log an option on it. It was from AL to VA which normally I just deadhead home to TN from AL but hey he looked at what they had and told me what they needed to cover. Hot doesn't always mean it will pay well but I always quote them to where it pays me well and sometimes I get it.

He helps me weed out a lot of options like that "this one can be bumped out for the next several days if they don't get their target rate", etc. So anyway, the load was from another broker, the freight unknown to my contact, with sketchy details. Normally I reject loads like that. Should have done it this time but I took a chance and got burned.

So again, I this is not something I do willy nilly on some silly whim or because I found something better. I don't do that. I got the details filled in when I got to the shipper. That apparently the original broker wasn't willing to be upfront with from the start. His only concern was covering the load. Whatever it takes. And he got burnt.

It was lose, lose for both of us. But I didn't agree to sit there for 10 hours to load beforehand. My rate quote was good for 500 miles and 2 drops don't by noon the next day. It didn't have an extra 24 hours of lost downtime figured in on it. It wasn't what was advertised when I got the real skinny from the shipper...

 

Totally fair, and totally understandable. I was just offering up a different perspective, based on last week's craziness. It was a *very* busy four business days spent trying to push a week's worth of freight in a very short window.

 

I get it everybody goes through that now and then. I probably could have avoided writing a book from my point on that by saying that scenario could have been avoided. I should have called the shipper before I got there or just rejected it period. I expect that brokers will tell half truths and lies in order to get their load covered and consider it part of my job to figure out beforehand what's good and what isn't. That's how I avoid a lot of BS loads but it isn't 100% always certain. Stuff falls thru the cracks.

 

One other thing excuses wear thin and everybody has one. Busy or not you have to take care of business or you'll lose it.

 

Call the businesses next door and ask them if the company you're going to is open on the weekend. Tell them you can't get an answer on the phone. Nothing to loose