paying the right party

allfreight

allfreight

Site Supporter
Oct 29, 2008
420
14
18
Oakville
2
Just want to know how other's are handling paying the right party when you discover double brokering. I am going to pay the carrier that moved the freight. Does anyone have a standard letter or indemnity agreement that they are having the carriers who are moving the freight sign to protect all parties?
 
We have terms and conditions that include restrictive covenants on the confirmations that we send carriers. These do not take effect until the shipment is loaded, thus we have tacit agreement to those conditions by the carrier noted on the confirmation. If that particular carrier double brokers the load, then we only pay the carrier who actually moved. The original carrier therefore has no contract with us, and no claim. I have been threatened with litigation for doing this, but have never been served a plaintiff's claim.
 
You can find an example of a carrier/broker contract on the NTBA website, www.ntba-brokers.com. This contract addresses the issue of a carrier brokering a shipment to another carrier, along with many other terms and conditions. You might find it useful to use on its own, or as a template for your own design.
 
Thanks for your responses, we do use the Carrier/Broker contract from NBTA website, we also have a clause in our carrier confirmation that says we will not pay. I think because of the economy we are seeing quite a lot. My concern is I want to pay the right party and make sure the double broker and the carrier cannot go back to anyone.
 
I had the same issue last year when I discovered that Mac Forwarding had double brokered some of my freight. I found out who the original carrier was and agreed to pay them but they were told they would have to wait, which they agreed as they were glad that they were going to get paid as Mac Forwarding had no intentions of doing so.
I never paid Mac Forwarding and when they finally called looking for payment they were told that they violated the terms of our contract and therefore they were not getting paid as per my carrier conformation. Thus sparked some choice words at which they were told take us to court as we have all the documentation and you do not have a leg to stand on. I waited several months till we knew the issue was dead with Mac and I created a Release letter for the actual carrier to sign which I mailed to them and had them mail back with original signatures. I have it on file that releases us of any future claims on the issue from themselves or anyone else.
 
What happens if you were not aware that the carrier you contracted with, was in fact NOT the carrier who carried the load, and you subsequently paid your bill as per your confirmation.. later you discover this carrier you had paid was not the carrier who took the load? Do you sue the carrier to get your money back?
 
What to do ???

Patchouli, if your at the stage of finding out that the carrier you selected had double brokered the load you gave them, then it's probably too late to do anything about it. Hopefully they paid the carrier that actually hauled the load. If they didn't or won't, you'll be paying twice. Even if you successfully sue the double brokering carrier, with the costs you'll be awarded, even on a substantial indemnity basis (rarely granted), you won't come close to covering your legal fees.

How is it that your customer (or the shipper) didn't know the name of the carrier you chose, and report to you, if a different carrier showed up to load their shipment???
 
We have trucks and sell loads (all our own freight) if we find out someone has double brokered the load we will pay the actual carrier direct and not give the double broker nothing and yes pay in 30 days or less from date of delivery. If we find on the truck side that we are hauling a double brokered load we will track down the original broker and call them direct. It is really very easy to do. The biggest give away to a double brokered load is insisting that you use their name and their name only at pick up. Call the shipper we need to rid the industry of these people.
 
We are very lucky. Our customers are very proactive in freight. We tell them which company is coming in. If the name on the truck doesn't match the freight they will not load the freight without our confirmation in email that this is okay. It has enabled us to cut out a lot of double brokering. In turn we have also expanded our carrier portfolio and we have cut out these cretons as much as we possibly can. I'm not saying that we have completely irradicate double brokering for ourselves, but we are one step closer.
 
Activet said:
Patchouli, if your at the stage of finding out that the carrier you selected had double brokered the load you gave them, then it's probably too late to do anything about it. Hopefully they paid the carrier that actually hauled the load. If they didn't or won't, you'll be paying twice. Even if you successfully sue the double brokering carrier, with the costs you'll be awarded, even on a substantial indemnity basis (rarely granted), you won't come close to covering your legal fees.

How is it that your customer (or the shipper) didn't know the name of the carrier you chose, and report to you, if a different carrier showed up to load their shipment???
Click to expand...

Thank you for all your replies.
In September we carried a trip with 5 LTL shipments which was double brokered to us by another tiny carrier.
We have not been paid.
I contacted all 5 brokers who brokered the loads to the carrier we got the loads from, and all 5 have confirmed they paid him months ago. Yet he has not paid us.
I wondered what the unfortunate brokers who already paid the other carrier will be faced with, once we demand payment for the same loads which were already paid.
Too bad everyone can't just do the right thing.
Thanks again
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom