RFQ

loaders said:
Well, interestingly enough, we just received an emergency call from the shipper asking us to "save his ass" because the new provider can't get him a truck for a load and go today. Fortunately we had one of our regular carriers basically around the corner and were able to send him in. The shipper has told us that it has been a nightmare for them, calls from irate customers complaining about late deliveries, damaged shipments, etc. It is too bad that he has to bear the brunt of the displeased customers, and not the "head honchos" sitting down in the US offices. There just may be more to this story, as you have experienced Shakey.
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I hope you raised the rate 20%. That would be for the saving your ass rate!
 
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Reminds of a time a few years back.. Shipper told me my price quoted was way too high.. way higher than the "other guy" who quoted that lane. So I asked him why he and I were still talking.. to which he responded.. "their rates are way better than yours, but they often can't come up with trucks" So I told him that I could give him super low rates as well and not come up with trucks too.. but, if he actually wanted trucks the rates would have to be higher.
 
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I was certainly tempted to do that Rob. However, I decided to take the high road and think about the big picture for the future. I know that, as the saying goes, "nice guys finish last", I still hold out hope that we can recovery some of this business. Time will tell I suppose.
 
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loaders said:
I was certainly tempted to do that Rob. However, I decided to take the high road and think about the big picture for the future. I know that, as the saying goes, "nice guys finish last", I still hold out hope that we can recovery some of this business. Time will tell I suppose.
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I'd say that was the right approach as well. Now they can plainly see you're not attempting to take advantage even when the opportunity to do so presented itself.
 
Any time we get these sort of RFQ's we tell the potential client we will quote out on a handful of lanes listed and if our prices seem fair, fair being the key word, then we can discuss details of their requirements and expectations. If they so no to this, then we simply don't do it. Another question we like to ask is: "What if we came to you with the exact rates you are getting now?" It gets us more into the discussion of where can we improve on service levels instead of playing the rate game.

Now that we've been around so long, we have a nice base of clients that just book with us and trust the rate will be at level to match their service expectations. We turn a lot of business away as soon as we recognize the "I am looking for the cheapest mentality".
 
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When we quote these days and if we do not get the business we let them know the rate is still good for 60 days but we will be looking for other business to fill our capacity and that seems to have an impact on the discussions. Mind you we have so much outbound these days we are not quoting a lot of people as we struggle to even sell our excess loads.
 
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