DRIVER WINS AGAIN

60MPH

Expert Expediter
if I were remus I would of DH over to marshall mi. "battle creek board" that is what I always did and it always worked out. I have delivered in on monday morning in the detroit area and have been like #25 or 30 I can't see why anyone under # 8 or 10 would stay there and wait for a load. unless you did not want to work. Yes I know its like 100 to 120 miles empty but it is well worth it, instead of sitting for 10 days. I understand you live in the detroit area but you just got to get out of there, away from all thoughs vans there. I live in the washington D.C. area and I have my company bonus me out to akron,youngstown, or the cleveland area if I don't get a load by tuesday night and thats like 300 to 320 miles empty for me. but thats what I got to do.


60MPH ALL DAY-EVERY DAY
 

cheri1122

Veteran Expediter
Driver
60mph, you say you have your company "bonus" you out of there. What company is that, if I may ask, and what exactly is it you're asking from them, and do you get it?
 

JoeMP2

Seasoned Expediter
WOW! Did I just witness "Remus" get a public stoning from our moderators? Heaping ridicule on the poor fella brings dishonor on the stone throwers. I don't know the full history of his supposed offenses or transgressions, but please, a return to civility is in order. If we are expected to follow a pre-ordained script here on EO, then I'm probably a short-timer as the welcome mat extended to me will be unceremoniously withdrawn. While I refuse to give my mind to the "thought police", I am eager to engage on the concept of free speech. I notice a strong tendency on the part of some to squelch dissent. Even "Remus" has the right to be wrong, to be innaccurate, to be perceived as negative without ridicule or piling on. So dear Mods, whaddaya say? Feeling frisky today? Bring your "A" game to this one.
 

Turtle

Administrator
Staff member
Retired Expediter
If you're sitting in Detroit for 10 days, and are actually in-service the whole time, there is no way you're not gonna get several load offers within those 10 days. Unless, of course, your acceptance is abysmal or your on-time performance is to where they can't trust you to deliver it on time. There are simply too many loads going out of there on a daily basis, or those ahead of you are turning loads down, for you to not move up the boards. You can be #30 on the board on Monday morning, and by Tuesday you'll be likely in the top 5 on the board due to outgoing loads and loads being turned down.


I ran a mini yesterday, one that the driver just ahead of me on the board had turned down. One of those Elite Services Air Charter Door-to-Door loads. It was 52 miles deadhead from Evansville to the airport in Owensboro, pickup and take it zero loaded miles to another address (about 1000 feet away, actually). A van mini is usually $50, but because of the deadhead involved it was offered at a flat rate of $100.

All things being equal, $100 to drive 52 miles, and then take perhaps a half hour total to get loaded and then unloaded, is a pretty good deal for a van that normally gets paid roughly $1.05 per mile depending on the FSC. But, all things weren't equal, which is probably why that other driver turned the load down.

The load offer came in around 1300 and was for a 1900 pickup (and a 1930 delivery), which meant that if you accepted it at 1 PM you would effectively be removed from any possibility of getting a better run on a Friday, maybe one with long miles for a Monday delivery. You can do the 52 miles to Owensboro for $100 and it's all good, but in a cargo van it's not likely that you'll get a load out of there on a weekend, and while there are places in Owensboro to sit for a few hours, there really isn't any good place if you have to sit the entire weekend. Which means deadheading another 52 miles right back to the truck stops in Evansville (so it's 104 miles now, for the $100, but that's still not too bad), or taking your First-Out and heading to Louisville or some other place (an additional 100-plus miles).

Suddenly $100 isn't really worth it. Not with having to commit to the load as early in the day as 1300 and giving up any hope of getting a better load out than that.

But, the load's gotta be covered, I know that. Work with me. I explained the above problems and concerns to dispatch and asked what they could do, otherwise I didn't think I could run the load. They offered $200 flat rate, which I accepted, but imposed one other condition. I could see it coming, an air charter on which the freight has exclusive use of the plane (just like us)... more often than not it's a hand load from the plane to the van, or it's a hand unload from the van to the consignee, often with an inside delivery. They said the load was 38 boxes, 1200 pounds. I didn't want any part of that hand load or unload for the standard $25 rate, not in and out of a plane on a cold, dark, windy night like that. I asked for $50 for each hand load or hand unload, if it occurred. They agreed.

I arrived at the air charter service just as the plane touched down. Turns out it was 65 boxes, 1700 pounds, milk crate auto parts, that were originally on two skids (one with the big black plastic lid and one regular skid with 5 milk crates on it), but the originating airport didn't have a forklift, so they had to break down the skids into the plane.

I backed the van up to the door of the plane, put an empty skid in the van, and we (pilot and me) crawled up into the plane and starting pushing the crates towards the door. I'd get out and put a few boxes in the van, then get back up and move some more closer to the door. Except for the knees on the diamond plate floor, it wasn't all that unlike shuffling boxes around in the crawl space under your house. An hour after I arrived the van was loaded and I was on my way on the 1000 foot (if that) journey to the consignee, where they had plenty of forklifts, and I was unloaded within 5 minutes. If the skids hadn't been broken down on the plane, they could have just driven a forklift over and grabbed it.

An hour drive over, an hour to get loaded and delivered, and an hour drive back. $250. I may have missed out on a better load by taking that one, or I may have missed out on a run that paid about the same. But then again, the other guy who turned it down was still here when I got back, so I very well may have still been sitting here all weekend regardless. And, my First-Out here actually is first out, which is no small consideration in a place like Evansville, as four other vans arrived while I was on that mini. :)

It's a cat eat cat world out there.

Slow and steady, even in expediting, wins the race - Aesop
 

Tennesseahawk

Veteran Expediter
Where does it say a mod can't state his/her opinion, regardless if the facts hurt one's feelings? No one is quelching anyone's "free speech" here. I won't even mention free speech is not a right on a private board. Oops... I just did. :p Dave stated his opinion of the facts. He didn't tell Remus not to post anymore. Frankly, I don't think he bruised his feelings one bit. Dave has something called TACT. He's not going to tell you off because he doesn't like you. If he ever comes close to giving you heck, it's cause he's trying to get you to see what you've done wrong. So lay off the mods!

-A bore is a person who opens his mouth and puts his feats in it. - Henry Ford
 

JoeMP2

Seasoned Expediter
T-Hawk... When one goes on line and proceeds to mock, ridicule and taunt another person, serious consequences can follow. That some mods engaged in just this behavior towards "Remus" is beyond dispute. If the taunted person who has been publicly shamed and/or humiliated should in a moment of despair bring injury to himself or others, then the parties who taunted him can face criminal and civil charges. Case in point: a 13 year old girl committed suicide in the past week after being taunted on line by her peers. She had self-esteem issues about her weight and was ridiculed unmercifully. The mockers now face imprisonment and civil damages for the intentional infliction of emotional distress. We don't know the mind or mental state of strangers. We don't know what their daily struggles are. We live in a litigious society. These sanctimonious mods hide behind a keyboard and taunt people with whom they disagree. Right about now, they should be squirming in their seats.
 

poison

Seasoned Expediter
10 days in one place is nuts we have sat 4 days b4 and thought I was going to go crazy I understand that this is the slow time or so I'm told.this week we DH from home(central fl.)God knows there is no freight
down there.we left home went to Atlanta and received one load offer to
El Paso.sat there 24 hours and started moving east.right now there are 10 trucks in Dallas so we will probably not get out of there till Tuesdays if we are lucky.I know what some of you vets in this stinking world of expediting will say,our mistake was taking a load to a
dead area like El Paso in the 1st place.but it's like this when you leave home on a Sunday and you don't get the 1st load offer till Wed.
you have to take what is offered as slow as it is or you probably will sit the rest of the week too.so all I can say is you people have fun and
if you like to sit and twiddle your thumbs for days on end just hoping
a load will come to you and pray that it pays enough to make you break even for your projected income for the month then this is the job for you.Myself in approx. 3 weeks I'm going to go back to pulling a refer.
as long as there are people on this earth there will be food to haul and that means I will always have freight to pull.we are looking at aprox.$1900 a week running from fl. to ca. and back every week.Sure haven't even come close to that not even one time since we started expediting in aug.just to many trucks and to much competition for no
more expedited freight then there is.some say think of your time off as mini vacations,but those mini vacations cost money too and if your
not making any money to begin with how in the world are you suppose to
have money to do things when your sitting.you can only read so much you can only watch TV so much.any way ya'll have fun with your mini vacations and your great money you make when your able to make it.I'm going to get a real driving job.heck with all this sitting week in and
week out.you know we were told at orientation that a certain percentage will not stay because they won't like the sitting and waiting for a load.They are right because they know it's not the best
place to be in the trucking world.I will leave you with this and you will see what I'm talking about.We are going to have to run 2-3 months
just to get out of this hole we are in.and we don't waste money on nonsense.have fun and hope y'all don't kid yourselves to long b4 you relize the financial hole your digging for yourselves.
SORRY FOR THE LONG POST.
 

cheri1122

Veteran Expediter
Driver
Sure there is, Panthercub, and you've got it when you're the only one in town - or the only one willing to do the job, which amounts to the same thing. It's called leverage.....
;)
 

panthercub

Seasoned Expediter
Unless, of course, the town happens to be Omaha, then being the only one in town doesn't matter, as there are no loads.

No, I'm not bitter......


Daniel
Panther 12055
 

cheri1122

Veteran Expediter
Driver
JoeMP2: Sir, your assessment is neither fair, nor accurate. The Mods expressed their opinion, based upon their knowledge, experience, and Remus' own statements. On a public forum, they have every right to do so. On this forum, posters are presumed to be adults, and adults must deal with the fact that not every other person will admire, or agree them. If they cannot deal with that reality, they have no business posting on a public forum.
The case to which you refer involved an adult woman posing as a teenage boy, to deceive a 13 year old girl, who had been a friend of the woman's daughter. The woman had an agenda, (to find out what the young girl was saying, or would say, about the woman's daughter), in pursuit of which she misrepresented herself. 13 year old girls are quite vulnerable to peer pressure, and being a public victim of what the young lady believed was a boy her own age, was more than she could deal with, emotionally. The woman responsible was sadistic, IMO, and should face the fulll responsibility for her actions.
To equate what you read here with such behavior, is flat out WRONG, sir, and you are quite mistaken. IMHO, of course.
 

Tennesseahawk

Veteran Expediter
One thing to add. Remus is an adult. If, by chance, he would be prone to commit suicide after recieving criticism; I'd submit he'd be more likely to have done so because he hadn't gotten a run for 10 days.

I'd like to hear from Remus. Did Dave's post hurt your feelings?

-A bore is a person who opens his mouth and puts his feats in it. - Henry Ford
 

davekc

Senior Moderator
Staff member
Fleet Owner
I agree with Cheri. Joe you are way off base with your comment, but that is understandable as you have only been here less than a month. The issue of sitting for 10 days in the same location was posted several times with educational information to rectify the problem. It was posted again, so a stronger response was warranted.
Apparently the first responses didn't sink in. As far as anyone squirming......not hardly. Your comparison has no relevance to this post.
Get a grip.
This is a expediter/trucking site, not a tea party for 13 year old little girls.

Jim's got it right.
"stop trying so hard to be offended"












Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator
 

FAMILYEXPDT

Seasoned Expediter
I WANT TEA!!!! and if dave does not give it to me it is because our carrier does not care!!!!!



p.s very hard to see any valuable info here lately due to all the "sludge"



-charlotte
 

davekc

Senior Moderator
Staff member
Fleet Owner
I am pouring a cup now:7







Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator
 

cheri1122

Veteran Expediter
Driver
>I WANT TEA!!!! and if dave does not give it to me it is
>because our carrier does not care!!!!!
>
>
>
>p.s very hard to see any valuable info here lately due to
>all the "sludge"
>
>
>
>-charlotte
So your response is to add more "sludge"?
"Valuable information" is in the eye of the beholder, and I think there's a plenitude of it here. Of course, you're welcome to disagree - there's a plenitude of that here, too. (Something for everyone, you know!)
;)
 

FAMILYEXPDT

Seasoned Expediter
Not quite sure where making an observation about the direction of a forum is considered "sludge" cheri, but...I do believe you have exacerbated the situation to the point of I will no longer be coming here either.When one has to "wade" thru a mountain of crap to get to an answer or valuable tidbit, then a "helpful" forum becomes just another internet bully board. The reason I originally posted here was to help answer others questions and to perhaps find an answer or 2 myself....that kind of response to a real problem is the type of stuff i am referring to. Thanks and keep up the good work

-charlotte
 

Jefferson3000

Expert Expediter
Cheri is not a mod. Hasn't been for some time.


Drive Safe!

Jeff

Driver for 15 years
O/O for 13 years
OOIDA #829119

[em]"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed." --Mark Twain[/em]
 
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