Here's one we can all relate to.

Nawk said:
Back in the day when we used to fill out the Inward Cargo Manifest there was a box for "Master Person in Charge" which was the driver. While we're not being told to 'press hard you're making 5 copies' anymore... once the drive moves that loaded truck he/she is on the hook for ensuring that it's moving within the laws of the land. You can't roll in to a scale 5000 Lbs overweight shrug your shoulders and say that's how the shipper loaded it. While the DOT may (or may not) listen to the drivers story... the citation will still be made out to the driver and/or carrier.
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Well, that's why Carriers need to start charging Shippers shit load of money for layovers, loss time, rework, detention anything they can in order to educate shippers about weight distribution.

The problem that I run into a lot is with custom paperwork because shippers always missing info like Tax Id for the customer, Quantity, wrong importer of record, forgot to send notice to customs brokers all the bullshit. well, what we do is put it INBOND and that's easy $500 minimum.

I have strictly told my drivers do not move until you feel comfortable with the weight and everything and if you pass the closest scale and realize its overweight then it's driver's fault and we charge the driver for getting the rework done at the nearest cross-dock and of course, we advise the Broker about the screw-up.
 
Thanks for the insight everyone, I'm going to meet with the executives here and see if we can put a plan in place to help our customers educate their shippers and also help our carriers plan our customer moves better, especially for shipments that tuly exceed 35 000 lbs. As we'll never cover for every eventuality our goal will be for shippers and drivers to try and work together more.
Jim, I really appreciate the time you took to call me and discuss both your perspective on this as well as your tool for loading weight properly in a truck. If only every shipper and every driver too the time to plan accordingly we'd all have less issue shipments.
I'm probably going to have to call the carrier back and let them know the customer is not approving of the additional charges. No matter what happens I'll have an upset carrier and an upset customer and we did not cause the problem. Isn't that always the case!?

Keep well,
Mike

I was hoping to start this thread to have a firm 'this is the law' response, but I can see that everyone has an opinion and in the end a professional shipper needs to know how to load their freight and a professional driver with the backing of his dispatch team needs to know how to distribute weight in his/her trailer in order to weigh legal on the road BEFORE leaving the shipper.

You guys and gals all rock, thanks. Good thread.
 
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I think so too. A shipper's knowledge should include how to load a trailer properly, particularly how their own product needs to be loaded and secured. We often put too much on the driver who is expect to be expert in loading and securing anything.
 
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MikeJr said:
I was hoping to start this thread to have a firm 'this is the law' response, but I can see that everyone has an opinion and in the end a professional shipper needs to know how to load their freight and a professional driver with the backing of his dispatch team needs to know how to distribute weight in his/her trailer in order to weigh legal on the road BEFORE leaving the shipper.
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SPOT ON, MIKE !!!
 
Gord M said:
This is the plight of our industry, if you have new equipment you can't haul for shippers that want to maximize the payload in the trailer. One company in Montreal ship all over the US, we had to stop dealing with them a few years ago because they wouldn't reduce the weights from 45,600 lbs. Our new tractors at that time with the extra emissions equipment put us over gross no matter which trailer we used. THe shipper could care less, they just got carriers with older equipment, but don't dare be late the loads were critical to be on time. THe ones that were a little lighter still had to be made legal, the drivers got very frustrated playing with bogeys when they only have a 150 lbs to play with at the scale.
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Hi Gord Miller , Sir your absolutely right, But I would like to share my recently experience which still intransit.
I got carrier confirmation of 35 00 Lbs gross weight. When I got paper it was hand written 44,00 Ibs which is fine but when i was pulling up trailer from dock it was too heavy, i was suspected to over weight but shipper said its well balanced. when I proceeded for scale Gross weight of vehicle was 80,098 Ilbs.
trailer axle was 35800 Lbs despite moved tandem to 41" even then it was 450 Lbs over on trailer axle.
sometimes needs to handle softly we can complain to shipper or broker but might chance to loose business on other hand.
 
Load securement should be on the driver. Load weight should be on the shipper; they know what they have and if they have heavy loads, they should be trained to load them properly. We load several places 44500-45000 lbs and never have issues because the loaders know what they are doing. The only way for a driver to accurately know their weights is when they are able to scale, and as long as they stop at the closest stop - the shipper should be responsible if they make a mistake and the driver needs to go back. Most times, when booking a load and the weight is brought up, we tend to say "as long as they know how to load it, we should be good" and most times, the reply is, "oh, they know what they are doing."
 
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The difficulty is some of the drivers back up to dock
let shipper load truck
close door and leave and never inspect the load or product then wonder why charge backs happen
 
The good drivers will make sure to point out anything that is out of norm, and they tend to know something is not right. They will even mention it, but the loader will get defensive and rebut that he or she always loads trailers this way and never has a problem. Unfortunately, without the proof of a scale ticket, no one will do anything so they have to go and get scaled, have the proof then go back to the shipper - and some scales are an hour plus away.

Happens time and time again, second verse same as the first.
 
the main question here is how can the driver know the proper weight of the freight, he only knows what the shipper has told him, or what is told to dispatch, half the time the weights are incorrect, you cant visually look at a skid and say oh ok got this,
 
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CONROY said:
the main question here is how can the driver know the proper weight of the freight, he only knows what the shipper has told him, or what is told to dispatch, half the time the weights are incorrect, you cant visually look at a skid and say oh ok got this,
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The driver will never know 100% the actual weight if only relying on the BL. Some shippers are not keen on understanding and following the "Shared Responsibility" law, and I would even say they deliberately hide the true weight. It is quite bad for flatbeds as overweight permits add a whole new set of requirements and increase cost. My rule is whenever the load is close to 45000lbs I send it to a nearest scale if not from a regular customer. It only costs $12 to have it scaled. Surly, cheaper than overweight tickets. Obviously, this has to be incorporated in the rate.....
 
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This might be a 'simplified" response Mike - but in my opinion:

A driver drives
A shipper ships

They both have knowledge and experience pertaining to their very different jobs. The shipper is responsible for knowing their product, proper loading and weights. A driver can only secure and check over what has been loaded by the shipper.
 
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