Panther Board Position

crazytruckin · Nov 12, 2007

How many of you P2 Fleet owners, O/O's, Drivers know that if you move from one zip code to another or in fact in some cases, just move your truck you will lose board position? We talked to a friend who drives for a fleet owner who was never informed of this fact. The Owner called Panther today to ask about this and was told that this IS true. What this means is, you are now a trapped cat. When you park it you better think twice about going to a store or driving to get a PM even though you are within the 50 mile radius of your board location. To say the least, this is so wrong!

Comments please!!

davekc · Nov 12, 2007

If you are going to move, send a QC message to confirm your move. Loads are based on the radius of the customers location. We don't pay much attention to board position except for somewhere confined like Loredo or maybe El Paso.

Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator

unorthodoxneon · Nov 13, 2007

This is true. I have brought this up with MR. StPierre and got nowhere with him. FedEx drivers are allowed to move aslong as they dont leave their 50 mile radius of the position.

They do have something he tried to explain to me that you can move but you have a certain distance and time before it will make you lose your board pos.

My truck is currently parked illegally and i'm shocked it hasnt been ticketed or towed, but i cant move it 1 mile down the road to where my designated parking spot is because i might lose my board position. I've been waiting since friday for a load in detroit.. I WANT OUT!!!

crazytruckin · Nov 13, 2007

Dave, we are not newbies, 7-1/2 yrs expediting, 5-1/2 years with Panther. Board position until recently has been based on 50 mile radius and if you are outside of that you are not on that board.
If you are saying it is based on your location relative to the customer, than even though you are 1st on the board and another truck is closer to the customer and he gets the load even though he came on the board after you than loads are not based on a first-in, first out basis. If what you are saying is true, board position means nothing and this is not fair.
As for sending a qc message when you are moving, what affect is this going to have on the fact that if you move your truck after you have been pinged your board position changes? This is what is happening and it was not the case previously?

crazytruckin · Nov 13, 2007

Randy, I feel your pain. 7 days in California, truck did not move, went from first out to third back up to first then back to third. Our team leader could'nt explain what was happening when I confronted him with the problem. They either honestly don't know what is going on or won't tell us.

davekc · Nov 13, 2007

Two issues. The first is that if you move, it depends on the zip codes that you are moving to. That is why I would QC them to ensure your position. If for example it changed, you would have a point of reference. That is if it was of real importance. We move around and have no real problem. As to whether it cost us a load? Not really sure as I mentioned, we don't pay that much attention to it. We do base a lot of our decisions on frieght volumes and how many trucks are there. Case in point, we had a truck today that was #9 on the board in Atlanta. Who knows what loads they did or didn't do. We got a 840 mile load from who knows what board as there are five there.

As far as dispatching, it would depend on maybe your board position, on time percentage etc. and distance to the customer. If you are more than 100 out, closest gets it regardless. Same if it is a 90 minute pickup. Might be 10 on the board but if the other 9 can't make a 90 minute pickup, it isn't going to that nine. #10 gets the first call.

Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator

unorthodoxneon · Nov 13, 2007

I've been sitting in detroit since friday night. Only got 2 loads. But was offered about 10 times. Each time pushing back my board position. This time i was offered a load that was to pick up at 8 in the morning and was offered at 8pm today. Thats 12 hours.. THats more then the 8 hours in advance rule and i'm back of the boards. I'm pretty livid right now. I've been on hold waiting for someone at panther to pick up the phone for the past hour or so. I guess i should go move my truck now since i'm already at the bottom of the boards now...

fortwayne · Nov 13, 2007

Ahhhhhhhhh - the joy of not being a cat person.....

Fort Wayne
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davekc · Nov 13, 2007

Should have moved Friday regardless of where you were at on the board. You are creating your own demise by sitting there.
The other option is to spend $200 on a room. A run offer should follow within a few hours.:7

Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator

crazytruckin · Nov 13, 2007

Dave, my point is, if I ask for a board position and I am told 1st out and move my truck across the highway (still within the same zip code) to get a PM and my board position drops and a truck parked next to me gets the next load this is not fair. This is happening. And how do you explain this; I delivered this morning, called for a board position, parked the truck, ate breakfast for an hour, called for board position and spoke with same team leader and dropped 2 positions to 10th. The team leader could not give me a reason, its just the way it is. This issue HAS got to be resolved. And by the way, as I stated when I opened this thread, to my knowledge no one on the road was informed about the zip code positioning or the fact that your board position could or would change by moving your truck.

crazytruckin · Nov 13, 2007

Randy, don't know how long you have been with Panther, but my advise to you or anyone delivering to Detroit or vicinity, GET OUT QUICK unless you are 1st out, want short loads or Canada.

unorthodoxneon · Nov 13, 2007

All post from friday have been made from the comforts of my own house. :+ The truck is parked at a church down the street. So it was there today (SUNDAY) during mass taking up space just so i dont lose my board position. Also note that their parking lots dont get completly filled on sundays so i'm not that big of a jerk.

Turtle · Nov 13, 2007

You can be at the Flying J, exit 2, Franklin, KY, and not move your truck one inch. Depending on which satellite you are bouncing off at this particular moment, you can be viewed as sitting in Franklin, or across the state line in Mitchellville, TN, and each time you change satellites you can change board positions.

Facing east or west when parked (your truck, not you) tends to make this problem go away.

Weird.

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

greg334 · Nov 13, 2007

Turtle,
I am wondering about the changing satellite thing, I mean with the GPS unit, there is no changing sats' I know of - it is a passive system and reads a number of sats' to get the position. If you are drifting more than a few hundred feet according to the GPS system, there is a real problem with the equipment you are using but with Qualcomm, the are a couple things that they don't divulge to the public about accuracy of their systems and how it works. The system on the truck reports back a GPS position as you know with all the telemetry but just because it reports back at certain intervals does not mean that it gets into the system and reported to the carrier.

Maybe a real update with the software to manage the fleet would be a solution?

Turtle · Nov 13, 2007

Well, the term "changing satellites" is bad terminology, quite incorrect, and I should quit using it. It's just that it presents a better mental image, visually.

My Garmin does the same thing on occasion. I once managed to to attain a maximum speed of 137MPH. That's impressive enough for a Sprinter that's maxed out at the factory at 84 MPH, but even more impressive seeing how the engine was turned off at the time, parked at a truck stop.

There are other areas besides the Flying J at Exit 2 on I-65 where things get goofy. But at that particular location, my cell phone constantly switches between two towers, too, one in KY and one in TN. A little north of there outside Elizabethtown where my niece lives, cell phones of everyone in her neighborhood keep switching between two towers, one in the Eastern time zone and one in the Central time zone. Can't depend on the alarm clock on the cell phone at all.

I think it's at the TA out just west of Nashville where one side of the parking lot is one Zip Code (where you're actually on 2 Panther boards), and the other side of the lot is another Zip Code (where you're only one 1 board). I think it's that TA, might be another one, I forget.

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

jands · Nov 13, 2007

crazytruckin, we have been with p2 now for 3 months. i wrote in regarding this issue the first week after we started, because we found out the hard way as well.nobody told us about losing board position if you moved the truck, and it happened to us in dallas. as for calling in or asking to move across the street, we tried that and still got bumped. we lost two days of work because of it. its not right at all and needs to be resolved.panther doesnt use 1st in-out, they go by who has a better acceptance rate.and heaven forbid if you reject a load, because you get a double whammy in that you lose board position and get whacked on your acceptance rate. its childish that panther treats their o/o's this way.

ebsprintin · Nov 13, 2007

zip codes

I've been with Panther since May of this year. In orientation they did cover the constraints of zip codes, but it was a point that would not have been covered until several drivers began pressing for what-if scenarios and whether the particular moves would affect board position. The discussion went something like this--Position yourself within fifty miles of hot spot. Q: Will I lose my board position if I move within the 50 mile radius?--A: You shouldn't lose your position if you don't move too far. Q: I'm only moving to find a better place to eat just down the street. How about that?--A: Just don't move too far. Q: What is considered too far?--A: If you cross a three digit zip code line then the computer will reset your board position. The actual exchange took longer to get to the point of the zip code constraints. I remember the discussion, because I was getting frustrated hearing the back and forth, and I'm the one who ended up asking for the definition of "too far".

That said, I've been in discussions on this forum getting advise on finding good parking locations and others have mentioned the zip code constraints, so somehow the information gets out.

eb

greg334 · Nov 13, 2007

RE: zip codes

Turtle,
I got it now, makes sense.

by the way, my $400 GPS Rockwell frequency standard/receiver (this is just the receiver nothing else) has selected 2 and 4 hz update cycle and even in some areas it has problems, like ver climb of 400ft per minute while sitting at a light.

easyrider2697 · Nov 13, 2007

RE: zip codes

cheese anyone?

fortwayne · Nov 13, 2007

RE: zip codes

you can 'disable' the qc if you want to move just down the street a few miles to eat. it is simple. you enter the message system like you are going to send a free form letter to dispatch. you type in the following:

L m a 2
e e l n
A * o i
V * n g
E * E h
* * & t

the send it like a message.......

That should fix this long standing problem. Think about it though.

Fort Wayne
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