The Freight Doctor

From the shipper’s perspective, are freight agents something you should be concerned with or worried about? The answer is no.

The Freight Industry has many different jobs within in it and common practice is for a freight agent to sign on in an independent contractor or employee capacity with a freight broker. The freight agents and the jobs they do are vital to the industry. The freight agent is not usually an employee, but uses a freight company that the agent can get a competitive rate to move shipments for their book of clients in order to pass along better pricing to their customers. Indeed, freight agents are definitely wanted.

As long as the freight company is using top line carriers then there shouldn’t be any any problems out of the ordinary.

In the freight industry, business is done like this all day long.

Why would it be done like this? Let’s give you the basic run down. An agent may have years of familiarity with a specific company. The freight agent has great expertise in handling that particular shippers freight and so the shipper is comfortable letting the freight agent handle the freight. The freight agent doesn’t have any of his/her own rates in place with any major carriers. That said, the agent will look for a reliable broker that has freight rates already negotiated down and in place with major freight carriers. This is very common within the freight industry.

Remember, what should be most important to you is that good top line freight carriers are used. This is one of the ways you, the shipper, can protect yourself.

As a continuing part on my series explaining accessorial charges, today I’ll go into Residential Pickup and Delivery Charges.

The reason for Residential Delivery and / or Pickup Charges for non commercial locations is due to the fact that there are a number of factors that impede a prompt delivery or pickup to the location. The reasons can vary from there being no loading docks or forklifts, the streets may be narrower and harder to negotiate in and out of for the truck driver and as general rule of thumb it’s simply just more difficult to pick up and drop off shipments in non commercial environments. Typically you can also expect a liftgate charge attached because there isn’t a loading dock for the driver to back into as discussed in my previous post.

You can expect fees for residential charges to range anywhere from about $50-$100 tacked onto your total freight quote or bill.

Once you’ve received your freight quote, you may see what are referred to as Accessorial Charges that are additional fees listed on the freight quote. In an effort to clarify your freight quote I will begin a series of posts that will explain what each of these fees mean and how they effect your delivery or pick up.

The Liftgate Charge is a fairly common accessorial fee. What is a liftgate? A liftgate is a hydraulic  accessorial device used to lower the pallet to from the end of the truck to the ground level.

Typically this is used for items leaving from or going to residential locations or those locations where there is no loading dock or there is no forklift available.

If you do not opt for a liftgate, the driver is only responsible for taking your shipment to the end of the truck and you must take care of gettig the pallet off of the truck.

You can expect to be charged anywhere from $50-$125 for the liftgate fee depending on your freight rate structure. If the liftgate accessorial charge is any higher than this, you shoud consider attempting to negotiate for a lower liftgate charge.

Looking for The Best Freight Quotes Online?
Check Out The FREIGHT QUOTE SHOOTOUT Here!

Having worked in the trucking industry for many years now I have seen just about everything the shipping and freight industry has to offer — the good and the bad.

Back in the day (as my grandkids say) all LTL (less than truckload) carrier rates were based on published tariffs and no discounts were applied. What the teamsters wanted to charge that year is what you paid - government regulation protected the carriers from competition and the teamsters union was able to control the industry through master agreements with all the major freight transport companies.

In 1979, that all changed thanks to Jimmy Carter and the Deregulation Bill, that protective shield of regulation was stripped away and a lot of the bigger carriers began dropping like flies. Ringsby, Truck Lines, Denver-Chicago, Leeway, ICX, Transcon, ONC, Delta Truck Lines and McLean were some of the bigger names that fell in post-deregulation America. With the frontiers now open, a lot of smaller, regionalcarriers began movie towards the West Coast and the North East and the compeition kicked in to high gear. Some companies began to offer insane discount levels of 45%-50%…now, they were also increasing their rates by similar levels.

This caused the development of FAK (freight all kinds) pricing. The term FAK means a mixture of different product types delivered in a combined load to a single or limited number of destinations. Instead of figuring out the classification and rate for each product, carriers determine an average rated which is applied to the entire shipment. This makes this easier for everyone involved and makes creating a bill of lading or freight bill much more simple. Interestingly enough, the development of FAK priving coincided with a decrease in the number of headaches I had every day.

As a product of the old school of freight shipping, I think the 1960s and 1970s were the best years to work in transportation because management and union employees were forced to work more ethically together…and, unfortunately, that’s not something you find very often in companies nowadays.

Ok, I think I’ve rambled on enough for today.

Freight Carriers will charge you for storing your shipment roughly 48 hours after they first attempt delivery.   If for some reason you are not available past that first 48 hours storage charage will begin to accrue. After the typical 48 grace period, you can see a fee of anywhere from $100-$130 depending on the freight carrier. The next day $130-$160. The day after that, anywhere from $200+ and so on.

However, there may be a perfecty understandable reason that you were unavailable. Possibly some sort of emergency. If you know that no one will be able to receive the shipment within the first 48 hours, the best thing for you to do is to get on the phone and call the local terminal where yourshipment is coming into. The idea is that you can speak to a real person there and you can negotiate to have the charges waived or at least reduced as long as you can give them a definite reasonable time for a postponed delivery.

If you missed my previous post about protecting yourself with freight damage or freight claims here’s a reminder:
Always Be Sure To Write Down Any Damage On The Delivery Receipt And Have The Driver Sign Off On That As Well Before You Take Receipt Of The Item.
A clean Delivery Receipt is basically telling the trucking company that the item was delivered in perfect condition and they’ll stick to that. I recommend that not only do you insepct the box, but you open the item as well while the driver is there. Make note of the outside of the box at very least no matter how trivial or minute it may seem. Even the most minor of blemishes on a box may be an indication of much bigger damage on the inside i.e., scratch on box, tear in corner, missing shrink wrap. So be sure to write this down on the Delivery Reciept and have the driver sign off on it as well.
This will give you the leverage to make a freight claim should any problem be discovered after the fact. If you don’t make any note on the delivery receipt, you have 15 days to make a claim, but don’t even rely on this. Do yourself a favor and make sure to make some notation on the delivery receipt for your own protection.
If you don’t you will lose 100% of the time against the freight carrier.
Don’t let the driver rush you or intimidate you, and if you feel like this is happening, call your freight agent immidiately and have them speak to the driver on the phone at the time of delivery about what you need to do in terms of making any notation on the delivery receipt.
If you don’t have time to do this, then get someone who is there that does have the time to receive the shipment. What takes a few extra minutes could potentially save you a ton of greif and money!

Do you review your Freight Bill and compare it to your original Freight Quote?

If not, why aren’t you? Besides the fact that it’s just a good habit, there are a lot of things you can learn from reviewing your freight bills but more importantly, you may start to catch discrepencies that you should bring up with the trucking company or freight broker that you’re dealing with.

If you discover discrepancies between the freight quote and the actual freight bill, You always want to find out what happened. Discrepancies happen for any number of reasons but the main reason to bring it up is that you can learn more about how things work and you send a message to the trucking company that you’re watching everything.

 What are some of the reasons that your freight bill varies from your original freight quote?

·        Liftgate – Did the trucking company add on a liftgate after the fact? If the load required a residential pick up or delivery, sorry buddy, there’s no way around it unless somebody in the neighborhood has a forklift. However, if this was a business to business delivery and there were loading docks or terminal pickup and/or delivery, there should have been no need for the liftgate.

·        Fuel Surcharge – With soaring gas prices the fuel surcharge goes up every week. If you sit on a quote, be prepared to see pricing go up the longer you wait to book the load.

·        Re-Weigh – “Uh, it’s bigger than a bread box” You guessed at the dimensions and the weight and the trucking company had to re weigh the item. I go over this on my previous post about Re Weighs.  

·        Misclassification or reclassification – This is the big one. You want to know your FAK Classification for the item you’re shipping out. There are 3PL (Third Party Logistics) Companies that will list the FAK on the freight quote. It’s always a handy piece of information to have, because sometimes trucking companies will re classify or misclassify the item(s) you’re shipping.

      Let’s use a common item for an example here. Take for instance a Wooden Chest in the NMFC (National Motor Freight Classification) book.

            The NMFC lists a Wooden Chest as item #80900

1. Sub 1  SU (set up) is listed as FAK Class 125
2. Sub 2  KD (knocked down) is listed as FAK Class 85

      Even though it’s the same item, the means by which it’s shipped will effect the class      and price of the bill. Be sure to know the exact dimensions and weight and how it was packaged because the trucking company may have not accurately Classified it. It could be either honest human error or someone decided to take liberties with reclassifying your shipment. That’s why it’s always good to work with a 3PL, Freight Broker or freight carrier that lists the FAK on the freight quote so you can compare it to the freight bill. Usually, as a customer, the freight bill is the only place you’ll be able to catch if a re-class has taken place.

So what happens now? Well the first thing you want to do is ask that your bill be explained and if the answer is not satisfactory, then request that the freight bill be recalculated and get your rep to help make those corrections on your behalf with the trucking company or freiht carrier. What separates the good Third Party Logistics companies and the bad ones are that the good 3PL companies are the ones that will help you with making these adjustments.

It’s not unreasonable to have your load pick up by the freight carrier the same day as your request. The trick is to get your load booked BEFORE NOON ( 12 p.m. ) at the location of the pick up. As long as you book your load before noon, the earlier the better, then most likely, unless there aren’t any drivers in the area, you’ll have your load on it’s way by the afternoon that same day. If you book your load after, chances are it’ll get picked up the following day. So get your freight quotes in during the morning. The earlier the better!

Freight Carrier Trucking Companies, try to fill their trucks as efficently as possible to maximize the amount of loads for each trucks delivery route. This is accomplished by trying to fill as much space as possible within the truck’s trailer by stacking lighter items on top of heaver palletized items.

Shipping items of excessive length also known as Over Dimension Shipments presents a challenge when attempting to fill up dead space within the trailer as the the freight carrier would like. Due to the fact that the trucking company will need make up for having less loads because your shipment is of excessive length, the freight carrier will make up the difference by charging you an Over-Dimension Shipment Charge.

The length that falls into Over-Dimension Shipments varies from Trucking Company to Trucking Company, but it will usually reside anywhere from 12 feet to 14 feet in length.

So how much should you expect to be charged for an Over-Dimension Shipment? Look for your freight quote to have an additional charge of anywhere from about $75-$150 depending on the freight carrier and the type of commodity that you’re shipping. If you’re asked to pay any more than that, then it’s a good idea to negotiate this fee down to fall into a more reasonable price range as noted above.

When you’re in a rush to get a freight quote so you can book your load, you may think it’s okay to give guesstimated shipping weight and dimensions just to get your freight quote, BIG MISTAKE. When you try to cut corners like this, all this does is give the freight carrier wiggle room to tack on hundreds of pounds to your order. And to put it in its simplest of terms more weight amounts to more money.

Although a re weigh sounds professional competant and accurate, most of the time they end up being way off. Never ever give the freight carrier the opportunity to give you a reweigh. It’s just not in your best interest.

When a re-weigh is called for, you need to be aware of how the reweigh was done. Was it re-weighed by floor scale or by forklift? 

You should always be cautious a forklift re weigh. Why? Because forklift re-weighs are notorious for adding hundreds of pounds to your loads. This is because the forklift scale can be extremely innacurate.

If there needs to be a re weigh, a floor scale reweigh is always the most accurate choice because they have to be certified. However, I have seen with my own eyes, loading dock personnel add boxes or even stand on the scale to boost the weight in order for the truck company to boost your bill. While I don’t claim that this is standard practice by any means, it DOES happen! It’s a lot like the classic “butcher puttin’ his finger on the scale” routine.

So what can you do to protect yourself from a re-weigh?

• Know your freight’s dimensions and weight before you even call for a freight quote. 90% of all products already list the shipping weight and shipping dimensions on the box. If you don’t have the item, ask the shipper if they have this information. Someone needs to get out that measuring tape and scale and if at all possible do it yourself.
• If your freight is based on a density calculation (size of box and weight) have the truck driver verify and initial the box dimensions on your bill of lading before he loads it onto the truck. Give him a measuring tape if he needs one. The driver won’t be able to weigh it, but at least you’ll have the dimensions variable nailed down on record.

 If you want to challenge the weight, call the trucking company ( Good idea to follow up with an e-mail ) and request a reweigh at the destination terminal.  Make sure that when you have this conversation that you request that the trucking company take a photo of the item on the scale for verification and as proof that there wasn’t anything added to the scale at the time of the re-weigh. And to take it a step further, if the item makes it to the delivery destination and they have a scale at that location, have the receiving party reweigh the item before they sign for it. It there are any discrepancies, they should be sure to note it on the bill of lading and delivery receipt.

Bottom Line: Do yourself a favor. Know your shipping dimensions and weight at the time you request for a freight quote.