ABF | ABF and Amazon

Ted Decker trk

When things are FUBAR, FIDO!
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Prior to Black Wednesday and the data loss, there was a thread about ABF building new facilities in southern Indiana and handling Amazon freight. First, I understand I'm a guest in the ABF forum and I'm not trolling or starting a fight, but I have questions. A few said ABF has been handling Amazon freight up to and including Final Mile/setup work and doing it profitably. I was postulating that big names like JB Hunt, Ryder Logistics, etc were doing this work with non CDL cargo straight trucks and guys being paid in the 10-16$ per hour range in my neck of the woods. I had made the comment that I was glad my company in essence had told Amazon to take that kind of work and shove it. I was pilloried for that remark. So I'm a little slow sometimes and had postulated the following situation and wanted to know if it accurately represented what ABF is doing.

We have a homeowner of a 5000 square foot McMansion in a gated community on a culdesac. Manicured lawn, topiary, and fine floor coverings throughout. Now said homeowner orders a new gas dryer, washer, and whizbang 96" flatscreen. Home is in service area of a small End of the Line terminal with 8 drivers all 20 plus year veterans of ABF and all 45 years old or older. Only access to laundry room and media room is long carry through the house or long carry around the house to rear slider . No two wheelers in house and path to back and back patio is flagstone, fine to walk on but not good for freight two wheeler. (I spent a short time as a bedbugger and most van operators do not use wheeled equipment in the house, especially a standard freight two wheeler). Now if I understand posts from before, two ABF guys (45 years old or better) are going to park two pups on the culdesac, perform the long carries and also do setup, which would include hooking up a gas dryer? Or does one guy show up and put the freight in the garage via pallet jack? And yes, setup of gas dryer does include hooking to supply line, Just got new washer/dryer four months ago and Lowes hooked both up, water gas drain, etc and carted away old ones.
 
Prior to Black Wednesday and the data loss, there was a thread about ABF building new facilities in southern Indiana and handling Amazon freight. First, I understand I'm a guest in the ABF forum and I'm not trolling or starting a fight, but I have questions. A few said ABF has been handling Amazon freight up to and including Final Mile/setup work and doing it profitably. I was postulating that big names like JB Hunt, Ryder Logistics, etc were doing this work with non CDL cargo straight trucks and guys being paid in the 10-16$ per hour range in my neck of the woods. I had made the comment that I was glad my company in essence had told Amazon to take that kind of work and shove it. I was pilloried for that remark. So I'm a little slow sometimes and had postulated the following situation and wanted to know if it accurately represented what ABF is doing.

We have a homeowner of a 5000 square foot McMansion in a gated community on a culdesac. Manicured lawn, topiary, and fine floor coverings throughout. Now said homeowner orders a new gas dryer, washer, and whizbang 96" flatscreen. Home is in service area of a small End of the Line terminal with 8 drivers all 20 plus year veterans of ABF and all 45 years old or older. Only access to laundry room and media room is long carry through the house or long carry around the house to rear slider . No two wheelers in house and path to back and back patio is flagstone, fine to walk on but not good for freight two wheeler. (I spent a short time as a bedbugger and most van operators do not use wheeled equipment in the house, especially a standard freight two wheeler). Now if I understand posts from before, two ABF guys (45 years old or better) are going to park two pups on the culdesac, perform the long carries and also do setup, which would include hooking up a gas dryer? Or does one guy show up and put the freight in the garage via pallet jack? And yes, setup of gas dryer does include hooking to supply line, Just got new washer/dryer four months ago and Lowes hooked both up, water gas drain, etc and carted away old ones.
I’m a recent retiree from ABF Freight...did PLENTY of residential deliveries. But never once did I hook up/install an electrical or gas-supplied appliance. Never. That opens up a whole new set of rules regarding liability should something go wrong. I’ve never heard of ACTUAL ABF Freight drivers doing that service either.
 
ABF doesn’t do things for free. If it doesn’t make a profit ABF doesn’t do it. We are not electricians or gas guys so your silly for even bringing it up. We also have work rules on amount of stairs we are required to climb and can refuse anything that is perceived as dangerous or if we feel we will damage property.
 
WE never hooked up appliances. Use to put treadmills together and deliver mattress for setup. But they sub all that out nowadays been years since we've had any of that crap. Our barn does very little amazon house deliveries anymore. Thank God
 
Prior to Black Wednesday and the data loss, there was a thread about ABF building new facilities in southern Indiana and handling Amazon freight. First, I understand I'm a guest in the ABF forum and I'm not trolling or starting a fight, but I have questions. A few said ABF has been handling Amazon freight up to and including Final Mile/setup work and doing it profitably. I was postulating that big names like JB Hunt, Ryder Logistics, etc were doing this work with non CDL cargo straight trucks and guys being paid in the 10-16$ per hour range in my neck of the woods. I had made the comment that I was glad my company in essence had told Amazon to take that kind of work and shove it. I was pilloried for that remark. So I'm a little slow sometimes and had postulated the following situation and wanted to know if it accurately represented what ABF is doing.

We have a homeowner of a 5000 square foot McMansion in a gated community on a culdesac. Manicured lawn, topiary, and fine floor coverings throughout. Now said homeowner orders a new gas dryer, washer, and whizbang 96" flatscreen. Home is in service area of a small End of the Line terminal with 8 drivers all 20 plus year veterans of ABF and all 45 years old or older. Only access to laundry room and media room is long carry through the house or long carry around the house to rear slider . No two wheelers in house and path to back and back patio is flagstone, fine to walk on but not good for freight two wheeler. (I spent a short time as a bedbugger and most van operators do not use wheeled equipment in the house, especially a standard freight two wheeler). Now if I understand posts from before, two ABF guys (45 years old or better) are going to park two pups on the culdesac, perform the long carries and also do setup, which would include hooking up a gas dryer? Or does one guy show up and put the freight in the garage via pallet jack? And yes, setup of gas dryer does include hooking to supply line, Just got new washer/dryer four months ago and Lowes hooked both up, water gas drain, etc and carted away old ones.
I thought these warehouse type facilities were being purchased/built for the new freight sleds that ABF is going to start using? I don’t know anything about warehousing for Amazon....
 
ABF doesn’t do things for free. If it doesn’t make a profit ABF doesn’t do it. We are not electricians or gas guys so your silly for even bringing it up. We also have work rules on amount of stairs we are required to climb and can refuse anything that is perceived as dangerous or if we feel we will damage property.
I felt I qualified it quite well, so I take umbrage with you calling me silly. This stuff existed in a thread that was lost in the data loss. People were trying to tell me that ABF offers these services for a premium rate and was going after more Amazon freight like this. My point was JB Hunt Final Mile, Ryder Logistics, Penske etc ARE doing these services with non CDL straight trucks and 2-3 guys on a truck making 10-16$ per hour and how could the traditional LTL side, ABF, of Arcbest be doing these services and pursuing this kind of business . I did not make the claim ABF was doing this stuff, I was simply looking to verify the accuracy of that claim
 
I felt I qualified it quite well, so I take umbrage with you calling me silly. This stuff existed in a thread that was lost in the data loss. People were trying to tell me that ABF offers these services for a premium rate and was going after more Amazon freight like this. My point was JB Hunt Final Mile, Ryder Logistics, Penske etc ARE doing these services with non CDL straight trucks and 2-3 guys on a truck making 10-16$ per hour and how could the traditional LTL side, ABF, of Arcbest be doing these services and pursuing this kind of business . I did not make the claim ABF was doing this stuff, I was simply looking to verify the accuracy of that claim
We are doing these thing. I put plenty of treadmills, ellipticals, hospital beds together. We do not do this for free. Just because Penske, JB Hunt, whoever else does this crap for pennies doesn’t mean we do. Don’t know how else to explain it to you. We price our services to make money.
 
We are doing these thing. I put plenty of treadmills, ellipticals, hospital beds together. We do not do this for free. Just because Penske, JB Hunt, whoever else does this crap for pennies doesn’t mean we do. Don’t know how else to explain it to you. We price our services to make money.
Therin lies the rub. The other companies have 1/2 the labor cost but Amazon chooses ABF?
 
Therin lies the rub. The other companies have 1/2 the labor cost but Amazon chooses ABF?
I'm not picking a fight. I understand LTL pricing. We don't do things for free either which is why we didn't pursue Amazon business because they in essence want it done in the cheap. Something does not add up, hence my curiosity.
 
We are doing these thing. I put plenty of treadmills, ellipticals, hospital beds together. We do not do this for free. Just because Penske, JB Hunt, whoever else does this crap for pennies doesn’t mean we do. Don’t know how else to explain it to you. We price our services to make money.
Trucker 206 & ltl1 would appear to have a different view
 
At my terminal it wasn’t arcbest subsidiary, about 8 years ago they filed a grievance for giving freight away to areas we covered & won it....
Copy that. Like I said I wasn't being obtuse or trolling for a fight , I just remember all the old "double breasting " with the unions and the nons. Didn't know if this was same sort of thing or a new animal as represented by UPSF getting stuck with two tier pay setup in last contract.
 
Prior to Black Wednesday and the data loss, there was a thread about ABF building new facilities in southern Indiana and handling Amazon freight. First, I understand I'm a guest in the ABF forum and I'm not trolling or starting a fight, but I have questions. A few said ABF has been handling Amazon freight up to and including Final Mile/setup work and doing it profitably. I was postulating that big names like JB Hunt, Ryder Logistics, etc were doing this work with non CDL cargo straight trucks and guys being paid in the 10-16$ per hour range in my neck of the woods. I had made the comment that I was glad my company in essence had told Amazon to take that kind of work and shove it. I was pilloried for that remark. So I'm a little slow sometimes and had postulated the following situation and wanted to know if it accurately represented what ABF is doing.

We have a homeowner of a 5000 square foot McMansion in a gated community on a culdesac. Manicured lawn, topiary, and fine floor coverings throughout. Now said homeowner orders a new gas dryer, washer, and whizbang 96" flatscreen. Home is in service area of a small End of the Line terminal with 8 drivers all 20 plus year veterans of ABF and all 45 years old or older. Only access to laundry room and media room is long carry through the house or long carry around the house to rear slider . No two wheelers in house and path to back and back patio is flagstone, fine to walk on but not good for freight two wheeler. (I spent a short time as a bedbugger and most van operators do not use wheeled equipment in the house, especially a standard freight two wheeler). Now if I understand posts from before, two ABF guys (45 years old or better) are going to park two pups on the culdesac, perform the long carries and also do setup, which would include hooking up a gas dryer? Or does one guy show up and put the freight in the garage via pallet jack? And yes, setup of gas dryer does include hooking to supply line, Just got new washer/dryer four months ago and Lowes hooked both up, water gas drain, etc and carted away old ones.
Ok so ABF negotiated certain specific things to be done. A customer cant just say hey I want you to install my new tub. They developed the training videos and literature for a few specific tasks(not that we always see those things but they exist and we are supposed to go over them before a turnkey delivery). The ones you always hear about are the treadmills and ellipticals because they tend to be the most challenging of that type of delivery. Turnkey deliveries aren't limited to Amazon and I did a few a while back where we delivered some large coolers to taco bells where we uncrated them, put wheels on them, brought them inside, and placed for use. One time I had to install a glass table top that had been broken and replaced by the manufacturer. One other was some furniture for a daycare that I had to unpack, place for use and remove the trash. Usually simple stuff.
 
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