Loading/Unloading Times

At loading/unloading places you can meet great people. I surely have met more than my fair share. Their job is tough also. I have met driver who I broke bread with, talked trash with, cut up and clowned with, and even talked about trucking and life in general. Great people, and many of them and I are friends to this day. I took my father, may he rest in peace, with me and he said the biggest kick he got while with me was the number of Drivers we bumped into that knew me, or how many drivers who knew me would see me on the highway and call out my name on the CB.

When I was local driver, I have experienced racism at different locations because the Mexican drivers were attended to before me, even if I was there first. See most generally, loading …show more content…
This situation is called " time spent". What I mean is that so many times shippers/receivers assign loading/unloading times just so that they know the trucks are there. Through my tenure, I have learned how to improve on ugly situations at these places. I have even pulled stunts to get loaded or unloaded before my actual appointment time. The number one curse to a driver is what is commonly known as " first-come, first serve" …show more content…
This means that there were more trucks getting loaded/unloaded then there were docks to put them. So, someone has to wait. That wait can be short, but it can also be very long. It can be even longer if the driver doesn't have complete/accurate information concerning the task at hand. This nightmarish to me. Delays are where a driver's temperament often get displayed. One reason for such temperament is that the driver, if loading, has only a certain amount of time to transport the load. If unloading, the driver may have a reload somewhere else, and delays here cause tardniess in reloading and even missed loads. In many instances, shippers will say they have to get their freight picked up and sent on its way, which for the most part is true. I think the bigger lies are when receivers say they need the freight coming to them in a hurry. Sometimes that's true, sometimes it isn't. It is my belief that the real reason is that these receivers not that when they freight is really needed, the freight is already in their possession. Therefore, to the best of my memory, I know of only one place I had ever been where that immediate need was a actual need. At this facility, the shipping/receiving supervisor was standing outside the building, looking up the street in my direction. When he saw me coming, he