Not to diminish this experience or similar ones others have suffered. I agree with the saying 'time is money', but I'll give you my take on this:
When working (for 15ish years) in transport, I found there was always talk about appointments or FCFS, but in the end we had a standard by which most people came to accept. 1 hour for LTL and 2 for TL. Funny how 1 hour applies to a single skid as well as 14 skids. That's crazy enough in itself. It was tried, tested and true. Everyone kept an eye on time and for carriers, who actually bear the cost of time at shippers and receivers (drivers time), it was up to them to notify several parties when there was a risk of detention time, then notify a list of people that detention time had started, then to get the shipper's signature NEXT TO the times written on the BOL (initialed by their wife) and only then after several other parties came to the table to approve this time, the $25 (for a half hour) can be paid/collected whatever. I've always asked myself, for all the extra work involved and all the calls, email, time and frustration everyone loses more than what this $25 cost was. Detention time in small amounts really just needs to be a lesson to shippers and receivers to get their shit together and get drivers on their way.
Some of us are more familiar with large amounts of detention. Now we're talking about police escorts, cranes, specialty equipment and pilot cars. If you don't have your ducks in a row, you have no business booking these shipments. This is my world currently. Guess what, we never have detention time, but we're also organized, keep an eye on the weather and have a high level of expertise and communication with all parties. I'm not in transport per se, my employer (led by our project managers) ships over length, height and width shipments.
Funny, I've been here nearly 4 years now, for all the deliveries we have of materials, mostly flatbed, b-train and some dry van goods shipped to us by our vendors not a single driver nor a single call has come asking for us to apply arrival and departure times to any BOL nor has anyone called us to ask to pay detention time. It's caused me to wonder if it's a real thing in the world or just something brokers and carriers argue over and once you are out of transport it becomes an old wives tale.
Anyway, we'll do our part here and keep drivers rolling as best we can. Everyone should do the same.
Keep well,
Mike
