For the benefit of on-lookers in this thread, I'll take a stab at a lay explanation of the System that FedEx Custom Critical uses to determine the most appropriate truck to dispatch on any given run.
Several years ago, the carrier purchased a chuck of software that they converted to the company's modus operandi for dispatching expedite trucks. They call the system the DVA for "Dynamic Vehicle Allocation"; although, some folks think DVA means "Do Virtually Anything". The system applies a point score to a host of Driver/vehicle attributes and matches these to customer and load requirements to determine the order in which a Dispatch Agent must call drivers for dispatch assignment offers. The system removes the human factor from truck selection and a Dispatcher must call every truck in the order that the DVA has placed it in the dispatch queue. The Dispatcher must make an annotation alongside every truck in the queue that was considered, but not assigned a given run. The annotation would include comments such as, non-response on the telephone, non-response on the Qualcomm, or driver refusal
When a customer calls in a load, the Customer Service Agent determines the weight, dimensions, and type of freight such as general commodity, refrigerated, heated, HAZMAT, nuclear, or A&E. Additional factors are obtained from the customer such as urgency of pickup and/or delivery, special handling such as padding, liftgate, air ride, driver load/unload, inside pickup/delivery, ramp or dock availability, low clearances or limited maneuverability at the customer location. All of the pertinent information is entered into the DVA and the software takes a few nanoseconds to develop a dispatch queue based on the marriage of the customer requirements and the following Driver and truck attributes.
The numerous truck attributes include Dwell (layover) time, closest to the pickup, less than 75 (short run status), capability to make promised pickup time, the size and weight capacities, dock high, special equipment such as furniture pads, straps, dollies, liftgate, reefer, air ride suspension, Temperature Validation (T-Val) equipment, team or solo operation, no ride-along pets, and FAST designation, SMS and other White Glove designations.
Driver attributes include, available HOS, citizenship (for cabotage consideration), FAST qualified, HAZMAT qualifications including A&E and Nuclear, T-Val qualified, PSS and other White Glove certifications.
I'm sure I've missed several items, but I list these to demonstrate that there is quite a bit more to dispatch considerations than dwell time and <75 status. Dispatch of trucks on the west coast should not differ noticeably from other express center locations.
