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FedEx Freight | Is Fedex saving that much money on purchase trailers??

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LTLlife

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I went to WME for the day/night for some training and the amount of purchase trailers they had on the yard and coming is ridiculous. How much do they pay for these company to come in and haul OUR freight? I had hope of them one day bringing back the sleeper/team cabs but that doesn't looks like that's ever gonna come back. Also notice a lot of containers & multimodal vans on the yard.
 
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The company saves an enormous amount of money using purchase vs pulling empties down the road and unfortunately they'll always be a need for purchase in the LTL industry. I don't like it any more than the next man but the best way to combat the issue is to pick up more freight in the lanes where purchased is utilized,
 
FXFE won't use sleeper teams because that's not how AF did things. It's cheaper to pay purchase $2/mi than it is to run a sleeper fleet.
 
stryker said:
They handled it like OD does. OD does not use purchase our rail. They run company teams and it works great. FedEx problem is they can not admit when they are wrong so they just keep throwing money at it.
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Like I said, teams weren't how AF did things. And AF is basically all that's left now.

I won't disagree with the notion that company teams are a brilliant idea because I believe they are. The problem with teams is finding two people who will put up with each other.
 
stryker said:
They handled it like OD does. OD does not use purchase our rail. They run company teams and it works great. FedEx problem is they can not admit when they are wrong so they just keep throwing money at it.
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Viking team trucks were short lived.
They handled the empty problem by having an entire department dedicated to selling truckloads with deferred delivery dates and dispatch routed those truckloads in the general direction of the customer in lieu of empties.
Definitely not the way we do it.
 
Canadian Flyer said:
We all know that isn't what the drivers are paid. That's what FedEx pays the purchase carriers. They pay their poor guys a quarter of that at best.

That's being generous, BRG.
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These purchased company's have people who will work cheaper with little to no benefits and more flexibility.
A new rug as been put on the LTL ladder at the bottom.
I see carriers moving loads for less than $1.70 cpm just to keep a check coming in each week. We know what happens when they miss a week or two, but their are plenty more waiting in line to go broke. Shareholder value is great is it not .
 
stryker said:
They handled it like OD does. OD does not use purchase our rail. They run company teams and it works great. FedEx problem is they can not admit when they are wrong so they just keep throwing money at it.
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I have seen OD city P&D drivers dropping and picking at the UP ramp so what's up with that ?
 
Richard Cranium said:
Viking team trucks were short lived.
They handled the empty problem by having an entire department dedicated to selling truckloads with deferred delivery dates and dispatch routed those truckloads in the general direction of the customer in lieu of empties.
Definitely not the way we do it.
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This is what the company I work for does. Speedy uses truckloads as a way to avoid empties in parts of their system where freight is unbalanced. It's at least a profit for the company rather than an expense.
 
Canadian Flyer said:
This is what the company I work for does. Speedy uses truckloads as a way to avoid empties in parts of their system where freight is unbalanced. It's at least a profit for the company rather than an expense.
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Thats what the free market decides and all is ok with most. But when YOUR the one sitting at the house and the repo man is cruising the hood all of a sudden its not the game you signed up for.
If the company makes money running the overflow up and down the zipper,Ya think they will ever hire again
 
Cab Lizzard said:
I have seen OD city P&D drivers dropping and picking at the UP ramp so what's up with that ?
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Cab Lizzard said:
I have seen OD city P&D drivers dropping and picking at the UP ramp so what's up with that ?
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Out west a company sends us a distribution load we pick up at the rail then break it on are dock. About 2 years ago they stopped the rail because it was to unreliable. Maybe in the Midwest our east coast it's diffrent
 
stryker said:
They handled it like OD does. OD does not use purchase our rail. They run company teams and it works great. FedEx problem is they can not admit when they are wrong so they just keep throwing money at it.
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See that's what I don't understand. It works great for OD, Estes, UPS, Saia and sometimes I see XPO doing it but Fedex don't
 
We are a regional, scheduled, LTL carrier, we're not a long haul LTL carrier like others so there's no need for team drivers. Purchase is utilized to move freight from region to region and within a region where empties are present in certain lanes.
Truckload is a cut throat business and many will haul a load for cost to keep from running an empty backhaul...and that's where we come in, in some cases they'll move the freight cheaper than it would cost us to move empties with a company driver!!
 
Cab Lizzard said:
Thats what the free market decides and all is ok with most. But when YOUR the one sitting at the house and the repo man is cruising the hood all of a sudden its not the game you signed up for.
If the company makes money running the overflow up and down the zipper,Ya think they will ever hire again
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They only take on truckloads going in the direction needed. For example, more freight is sent to Montreal than comes out. The trailer ratio is at least 3 to 1. So to avoid going back to Toronto empty, they get a couple of truckloads to fill in the gap. Doesn't matter where they're going, because if the destination isn't Toronto it just carries on from there with another truck.

It's not about making money filling in the gaps. It's about making more money than the expense of moving the trailer empty. Because I get paid the same whether it's an LTL load or a truckload.
 
Richard Cranium said:
But it gives you such a warm, love my company feeling when they call and tell you your run is cut because there isn't enough freight meeting you so they're going to unload your two pups and call in some more PT.
SURE FEELING THE PURPLE LOVE THOSE DAYS.
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I agree...it's happened to me many of days and it sucks!! But I also see the bigger picture, if we ran a bunch of empties up and down the road everyday, it wouldn't take long and none of us would have a job.
Again, the answer IMO is to concentrate on getting the freight needed to fill those lanes...perhaps that should be the next competition for sales/city operation...to identify which lanes per center carry the most empties and try to target that freight from our customers to fill those lanes.
 
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