question about dispatchers...potential good thread here!

Load planners don't look at your logs before they give you a load. They see a empty truck in the area of a customer, and that's basically it. If you don't communicate and don't give your dispatcher a PTA (Projected Time of Availability), the load planner has no idea what your plans are. A good example of communication would be:

~ Truck number #12345

~ Trip number 8675309

~ D01 (first delivery) delivers @ 0830 on 12/1/11

ETA to D01 is 0800 on 12/1/11

PTA is 1930 on 12/1/11

This tells your dispatcher and load planner you want a 10 hour reset, so the load planner won't give you a reload that picks up before 1930. If you get one before your PTA, refuse it if you don't have the hours. I've had load planners give me a reload with too much deadhead to the point it conflicted with my PTA. After communicating with the dispatcher, the appoitment time was readjusted. State the reason why you refused a load also. 9 times out of 10, appoitment times can be rescheduled to fit your needs.

Communicate, communicate, communicate

 

Even on your crappy AS400 systems your planners can see the drivers hours (assuming they send them in), when the hours look good a driver should be dispatched. If they dont' have the hours the load shouldn't be planned. But yes, you should make sure you have the hours, and so should your dispatcher. It should take your dispatcher about 32 seconds to figure out if you have the hours of not.

 

They can see them, yes. But only when they bring up that window on their computer. If your dispatcher/load planner has 100s of trucks in their fleet, they don't have the 32 seconds to say "hey, lets see if this driver has the hours to run this load". Dispatchers aren't babysitters. They have tons of things to do at once.

 

I'm gonna disagree with you. When I worked in dispatch that was in fact my job. and logs, and compliance, and drug test, and utilization, and mpg, and safety meeting attendance, and load securement, and performance evaluation, and verbal dispatch for 30 days after a service failure. You have as much time as you make. It can get hectic, but you just deal with it or have a breakdown.

 

You may be the one exeption then. Many dispatchers won't do this. They typically won't look at a drivers logbook until after they get a refusal response back from the driver. They see a empty truck, and give that driver the load. Usually the load planners at my company go off your PTA. You tell the DM what time you will be available, and the DM relays that to the load planners. You are never in direct contact with the load planners at my company, which is why communication is so important.

 

Fair enough, turns out this is a good thread. Anyone else wanna jump in? Or should THBatMan8 and I just keep running with it?

 

Either way doesn't matter to me. You're alright to chat with.

 

I was thinking the same thing. That's odd because I typically don't like anyone.

 

Join the club.

 

My former tanker dispatchers were on salary plus o/t. We used qualcomm. They would plan you based on the q/c hours.

It was up to them to get the sold freight covered. Service failures went against their quarterly bonus. They knew how much something paid and dispatched accordingly. Co. rolled first then I/C.

Mine were caught in the q/c software adjusting hours to accommodate the need. They would try to pressure you into doing things however a firm stance and they backed away. Good folks for the most part.

The problem I saw and still see today is the CSR's. They take all loads regardless of availability...they won't say no and then the dispatch has to cover it.

JMO