The Freight Doctor

Something a little distressing has been brought to my attention recently. The appearance of a new charge on the freight bill:
The Freight Reweight Charge. When did this happen? In all my years in the freight buniness, I’ve never heard of a reweigh charge on a bill before. Evidently, this fee can range anywhere from $20-$50 depending on the freight carriers that have begun to implement this fee.
The reweigh fee on the freight bill has only recently been popping up with a few of the more bold freight carriers. I just can’t see how these freight carriers can justify this new fee. Generally when a freight reweigh is called for, it’s to correct the weight because the freight carrier believes that the shipment is heaveir than the customer stated. I haven’t ever heard of a trucking company calling for a reweigh because they felt that the shipment was estimated as being lighter than the customer stated. That said, when a reweigh is called for you can expect to be charged more on your freight bill even before paying any reweigh fee.
Now again, as I’ve said in the past, shame on the customer who ball parks the weight or dims of their shipment because of ignorance or trying to round down their shipment’s weight in the hopes of getting a better price. You’re not usualy going to get one over on these guys and you’re just asking for trouble down the line when a revised freight chage shows up in the mail, however, this isn’t grounds to double charge customers. Especially because this new re-weigh charge was never part of a freight bill until very recently.
I say to anyone who sees this new fee on their freight bill to contact their agent or broker immediately to dispute this new fee as the freight carrier will get their money from the reweigh itself. At very least demand a certified document that explains the freight reweigh for your approval.

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.

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.