Snowman7 |
07-04-2009 01:36 PM |
Quote:
Originally Posted by Graymist
(Post 454907)
What exactly does dock work entail ? What are the challenges and working conditions ? I'm curious to know because, since I haul pneumatic bulkers, I don't need to go anywhere near a dock.
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Most of the freight is on pallets so its alot of forklifts. There is some hand freight. Sometimes skids gets tipped over and have to be restacked. There is alot of getting on and off the forklift to check shipping labels, move dunnage, sign bills on to a manifest, etc. There is oddball or ugly freight and either is not on a skid or is on a skid but doesnt stack well. We use the whole trailer so we build decks, use dunnage, stack racks, load bars or whatever we need to cram more freight in. It would be similar to packing the station wagon for vacation. BTW its easier to stuff freight in a trailer then it is to get it out so unloading a poorly loaded trailer can be challenging. The nature of LTL is handling small shipments, I dont mean small size I mean small quantity, not enough to justify a full truckload. We use a hub and spoke system. Lets use OH for a small example. We have terminals in Toledo, Cleveland, Richfield, Youngstown, Mansfield, Columbus, Dayton, and Cincinatti. Now each terminal spends the daytime delivering and picking up freight. In the evening this freight is put on outbound trailers destined to a hub, Detroit, Pittsburg, and Columbus for example are hubs. We have freight for all these small cities but not enough for a direct run so we take all freight destined to these Ohio towns to Columbus. At the same time they are all doing the same thing. Road drivers come in at night and take the trailers to Columbus and have a big dock party exchanging all the freight. After I pass out my freight and have recieved all my freight from the other drivers I go home. When I get back, inbound dock workers strip my trailers and put it on city trailers to be delivered and the process starts all over. Thats a small snapshot of regional overnite delivery but we have over 200 terminals and can ship anywhere in the country. As you gain seniority you get longer runs, meets, turns, and things that dont involve dock. Or your run is too long to spend much more than an hour or so on the dock and still make it back in time. We have teams, triples, laydown runs (take your break in a hotel and return the next night). All sorts of stuff. Some guys like the dock. I mean we get $23/hr to drive around on a forklift. Extreme heat or cold can be challenging. Some loads are easy some are difficult. Its a mixed bag. Think of LTL as a bus network with schedules, regular runs, switches, and exchanges. Some freight gets on and some gets off at each stop. The more full the bus the more money you make and the fare is cheaper. Now think of OTR truckload as a taxi service. You pay for door to door no matter how much freight goes in the car for a higher fare.
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