How Many Times Do You ACTUALLY UNLOAD YOURSELF?

G-Town gets it done:

Do I "help" on occasion? Yes, I do. Am I supposed to do that? No.

I do the same thing, constantly trying to help/speed up the process. A lot of my product is stacked on dunnage. If by placing/removing the dunnage as we go I can keep the forklift operator seated, it keeps everybody moving.

About 4 hours a night Monday through Friday lol

Gross. I Made sure to avoid the 2 bids we have that include dock work. Luckily OD wants drivers driving so there is not a lot of opportunity for dock work even if I wanted it.

I follow in G-Towns footsteps. Anything that gets me off the dock quicker is a plus in my book, plus I like learning methods for efficient restacking when things like that happen.

Prime does floral loads given to teams that are driver unload. They are mutli stops, but are exhausting from what i hear. I never did one, but lease ops say they pay them well. Not enough for me to do it though lol.

Rick it varies widely depening on the freight being pulled and the type of company your employed by. When I pulled a box for large companies I never had to unload, except one time they asked me to repower a load and forgot to mention it was a store account. I learned really quick what those were about.

I pulled a flatbed for a private fleet and we had cranes on the trailers. We unloaded every piece ourselves and it was usually 5-19 stops per load.

In the tanker world. About half my loads I have to unload. Drag a hose a few feet, hook up an air hose, and open a valve. Pretty simple as long as you do it correctly.

G-Town gets it done:

Do I "help" on occasion? Yes, I do. Am I supposed to do that? No.

I do the same thing, constantly trying to help/speed up the process. A lot of my product is stacked on dunnage. If by placing/removing the dunnage as we go I can keep the forklift operator seated, it keeps everybody moving.

Thank you. Nothing takes more time on the dock than having to get on/off the lift.

If it comes off my trailer, someone will need to unload it, unless they want to let me use a forklift. And pay me.

Hand unloading? Never going to happen.

I ran into an unload situation only once, and it was a very bad experience.

I had a three-drop load at furniture stores in the Bay Area for Ashley Furniture. When I got to the first store I was advised that they do not enter the trailer, and I had to bring the pieces to them. I'm talking a trailer load of full-size sofas, recliners, etc., all stacked tightly together like Tetris.

So, several male store workers stood at the dock watching me try to horse the first sofa off of the top of the stack. I did what one can only do in that situation, and yanked the top sofa off and let it fall to the floor of the trailer. Immediately, a female worker charged out of the store and began filming me, saying she's going to report me to Ashley.

I walked up to her and said, "Lady, you can film all you want, but I'm not moving a muscle until you get somebody in here to help me unload." And just stood there with my arms crossed, waiting.

Eventually three of the lazy bums standing on the dock finally came in and unloaded the trailer while I stood and watched. LOL.

I told my dispatcher to never, ever give me an Ashley load ever again, and if they try it I would refuse.

BTW, I was 62 at the time, literally three times the age of the lazy bums standing around the dock watching me struggle with THEIR furniture.

As I was saying - you see a lot of companies advertising "No Touch Freight".

For the most part - the majors (Swift/Prime/etc.) are hauling "long term contracted freight", to/from places that do their own loading/unloading. With the exception of dedicated runs to retailers that don't have docks/forklifts/etc - most drivers won't see the inside of their trailers unless they're sweeping them out.

Given my physique - I can drag a pallet jack with the best of them - but I ain't unloading pallets worth of product by hand. I'm certified in light, heavy (16K) forklift, and container handlers (the ones you see at the port putting containers in stacks and loading them onto trailers) but I doubt any consigness is going to let me run theirs.

And I don't think $25 (or even $50) is going to get me to shuck 48K worth of product out of a box.

And it appears (for the most part) - folks on the board working for majors, don't have to handle freight.

That's what I was trying to find out. Is NOT TOUCH FREIGHT actually HANDS OFF - and how often folks actually have to fingerprint a load.

Rick

Interesting question that you don't see asked or posted about. Many companies advertise "No Touch Freight" - and with the exception of some dedicated accounts (Dollar General comes to mind, where drivers have to shove entire loads off) most folks bump a dock and get themselves unloaded.

How many folks here have had to drag pallets or hand unload a box - and how often does this end up happening in reality?

Rick

I once helped pick up some fallen stuff at a grocery store delivery and once helped pick up some stuff at a food pantry (refused produce). So, much less than once a year average. I didn't really have to do anything either of those times, but it got my moving faster.