Using Freight Brokers and UShip for back loads.

[ericmoss37]

Being a new fleet owner how long should I let my guy lay over before I start looking for back hauls into busy freight lanes? Panther says they permit you to do this on their insurence, but do they give you a penalty if you tell them that you have one of these back loads in transit when they call you for a new load? Does Panther get a cut of these back loads that could be LTL or Expedited freight in straight truck?

 

[butterfly610]

I'm not an owner, but I thought Panther said that you negotiate the amount and then they (Panther) will set up the load for you when you give them the company's information and I believe they do get a percentage of what you make off of it. I think the place you're getting the load from has to pass their credit check. They would know you're on a backhaul, so doesn't seem like they'd offer you a load until you're done, unless it picks up where you are dropping off. Anyone feel free to correct any of this information, but this is what I think the process is. And to answer your question about how long you should wait, I've talked to some people who say if they're going to a really bad freight area, they start looking and trying to book a backhaul before they even get to the delivery....then they won't have to sit and wait. They just get back into a good freight lane.

 

[cheri1122]

Panther does not penalize you for booking backhauls. They do arrange the load, after you have the broker fax the details, for which they take 15%. That's a fair amount, IMO, as it ensures that you will get paid for the load, along with using Panther's insurance.
As for how long to wait before looking for a backhaul, that's entirely up to you, and your (or the driver's) tolerance for waiting, and how good the area is for getting out.

 

[groinster]

Panther does not penalize you for booking backhauls. They do arrange the load, after you have the broker fax the details, for which they take 15%. That's a fair amount, IMO, as it ensures that you will get paid for the load, along with using Panther's insurance.
As for how long to wait before looking for a backhaul, that's entirely up to you, and your (or the driver's) tolerance for waiting, and how good the area is for getting out.

Panther says to give it 24 hours, but really, it has a lot to do with where you are at, and how good or terrible the freight is there.

 

[Crazynuff]

I'd avoid UShip like the plague . Shippers shop around for cheapest rates , jerk you around , commit , then cancel when somebody contacts them with a lower rate .

 

[nightcreacher]

question,how do you get paid on back haul loads?i surely hope your getting at least the mileage pay that you went out bound for,or do you get a percentage of the cheap broker loads,this would make me very nervous

 

[arkjarhead]

With Panther you 85% of what the load pays. It doesn't matter if it is higher or lower than the contract amount. Why do all brokered loads have to be cheap? I know people that do nothing but haul broker loads, and they make a pretty good living.

 

[CharlesD]

With Panther you 85% of what the load pays. It doesn't matter if it is higher or lower than the contract amount. Why do all brokered loads have to be cheap? I know people that do nothing but haul broker loads, and they make a pretty good living.

I do a lot of broker loads and you can find good paying ones. You just have to dig around for them. There's a lot of cheap junk out there that isn't even worth starting your engine for. I can't stand uship because a lot of the people listing stuff on there just don't communicate fast enough for my liking. Many times I've tried to communicate with a shipper and by the time I got a response I already had something else booked. I use getloaded quite a bit, but normally to just cover relocation costs. I loathe deadheading.

 

[Fr8 Shaker]

Nobody likes to deadhead but to accept a load just to cover relocation costs "fuel" is what keeps all this cheap freight around. So when you cry you can't find any good paying loads you have no one to blame but yourself.

 

[Turtle]

Nobody likes to deadhead but to accept a load just to cover relocation costs "fuel" is what keeps all this cheap freight around. So when you cry you can't find any good paying loads you have no one to blame but yourself.

Every time you haul cheap freight to cover relocation costs, not only does it keep cheap freight around, it pushes down the other rates, as well. It amazes me how so few people can actually see that. If you take a load to an area where you will likely need a cheap freight backhaul to get out of, you should have negotiated a price up front to cover the costs of relocating, or you should have never taken the load in the first place.

 

[fastrod]

A lot of people talk about cheap freight but I have yet so see a number put to it. I drive a van so I will put up what I believe is cheap van freight. Anything under a dollar a loaded mile without fsc is cheap van freight. Any one else want to post the numbers they think equals cheap freight?

 

[davekc]

There are plenty of decent loads out there, but it does take alittle effort to find them. We avoid the cheap loads but are guilty of double dipping to get a acceptable rate to the truck.
Same deal as trying to haul a tractor load with a straight. With some decking and alittle work, it can be done barring the load isn't too heavy. Just have to do some shopping for the right ones.

 

[CharlesD]

I guess by cheap I mean anything under a dollar, usually non urgent LTL loads, the stuff that shippers and brokers think should "ride along" with something else. You call about a load and they say, "it's only a partial." When I hear those words, I normally just get the heck off the phone because I know it won't be paying anywhere near enough money. But I have been known to take something around .75 or .80 if there's nothing else there and I can get to a hot area where I'm seeing a lot of good loads. If a partial load isn't urgent, then I don't expect them to be paying an expedited rate, and in a van any partial that isn't an expedited load is often way to cheap to even consider running.

The thing that bothers me is when you're bidding for loads on an expedite board and someone has just gone and bid .75 a mile to get a load. I lost a bid today to someone who bid .50 a mile for an expedited load. Now why would a carrier bid that low unless it's to combine more than one expedite onto a larger truck, effectively running expedited loads at LTL rates? I talked to a semi driver who told me his company asked him to pick up four loads in one city that were time sensitive and all heading in the same direction. He said his company had bid about .45 a mile for each load just so they could put them all on one truck and get a decent overall rate for the miles. It's that kind of junk that's driving the rates down. I don't blame non urgent LTL loads for that, but when people run expedited loads at LTL rates, it just ticks me off to no end. Any load that is supposedly time sensitive should pay enough to run it by itself in an appropriately sized vehicle. It shouldn't require another load to be run with it to make enough money for the run.

 

[davekc]

I personally wouldn't consider .50/.75 loads as expedite. Those are LTL. Or at least that is how I view them. But, you are right, it is amazing to see what some loads actually go for.
"Desperate people do desperate things"

 

[arkjarhead]

When I pulled flatbeds we would haul this wire out to the Port of Long Beach,CA to be shipped to China. Alot of times I might pick up 2 or 3 small peices of equipment that were going back east. All combined it would pay as good or better than any full truckload. One time I picked up a decent sized genarator one place in L.A. then went to Backersfield and picked up a small tractor. Both delivered within 30 miles of each other. It's all about being at the right place at the right time. Sometimes you can find a full load that needs to go and the broker can sweeten the deal up a little. We did alot of stuff with Tennesse Steel Haulers. They do flats and vans.

 

[CharlesD]

I personally wouldn't consider .50/.75 loads as expedite. Those are LTL. Or at least that is how I view them. But, you are right, it is amazing to see what some loads actually go for.
"Desperate people do desperate things"

I agree with you, but sometimes you see a load with a timeframe that qualifies it as expedite, and it's on an expedite board where most of the loads are paying quite well, and then some bloke comes in there and bids .50 just to undercut everyone. I don't have a problem with non urgent freight moving at LTL rates, but when people start moving an urgent load at that rate, I get a little hot under the collar.

I will run a non urgent LTL to get to another area sometimes, or I'll combine a couple of them for a good rate, but I always inquire about the time frame and if the load is time sensitive I always ask for a rate that would move it by itself and if they tell me "but it's only a partial" then I won't run it. But here's an example. The other day I was in an area that was saturated with vans and thought I would try my luck in a city about 300 miles away. There were no expedited loads heading that way, but there was an LTL that didn't have to be there for three days but was ready for pickup. I took that one at an LTL rate and I don't have a problem with that because that load wasn't an expedite load. That same day I was seeing a couple time sensitive loads on a broker board and they were wanting to pay .50 because the load was "only a partial." So you had a broker with a load picking up and delivering the same day 400 miles away and wanting to pay .50 a mile because in their minds it wasn't a full truckload and therefore not worth a full rate. That's just a crock if you ask me.