What's the difference?

Getting paid "Practical Miles" verses getting paid "HHG" could add another $1,500 or more per year onto your salary. Let's say you get a load from Baltimore, MD to Houston, TX. You drive 1,475 miles. Using "HHG" calculations your company pays you for 1,400 miles. Using "Practical Miles" your company pays you for 1,450 miles. So with "practical miles" you actually get paid for closer to the amount of miles that you actually drive. In this example that is an extra 50 miles. If you are paid .30 CPM that is an extra $15 in your pocket for this one trip. Over the course of a year, this little $15 or so per trip really adds up.

 

I've found that difference is closer to 10%.

I am paid on HHG miles. My out of route miles has averaged 13%. 10 percent of this is the difference between the distance of the trips and the amount of miles the trips pay. The remaining 3% is due to having to drive to truck stops or other safe havens when I don't have a load.

I have tracked the difference on many of my loads and the miles my GPS says is typically 7-11% more than what the Qcom says the trip pays. The % difference is far greater on shorter runs. I've had plans where the deadhead miles paid 8 miles and the most direct route was 25 miles so that's a difference of 200%. On a longer run of 400-600 miles you can bank on being shortchanged 10%. Having hazmat can throw a bigger monkeywrench into it if you have to detour around tunnels (PA) and take bypasses around major cities.

 

and if you do shags in a city (Phoenix comes to mind) On HHG, forget it. Werner paid miles plus $30.00 I did one from the yard 51st and Lower buckeye to I-17 & deer valley. 52 miles round trip HHG said 0 miles. plus when i got back to terminal shipper forgot one pallet, so had to go back. 104 miles for $30.00. Thats less than 30 cents a mile, but when its your truck, not good at all.

 

It really depends on how the company computes "practical".

If a company has used Rand Mcnally to compute HHG miles. They generally use the same software to compute practical. Rand McNally allows 2 differant settings for practical computation.

Practical Route and Practical Miles. One being 5-7% longer than HHG, the other being 2-4% longer than HHG.

Very few companies use PC*Miler to compute practical miles. But when they do, it reflects the numbers you gave in your post.

The thing to keep in mind, is remember to ask what software the company uses to compute "practical". Otherwise you may still be getting shortchanged by a country mile, for each trip.

 

I think i varies, 7 - 10% depending on the length of the trip.