Know Your Freight Lanes and Customers

Hopefully, when you were being recruited, you asked about the company’s customer base and its freight lanes. Ideally, you chose a company that runs in an area you’re comfortable driving through and that will route you through the house regularly.?

Now that you’re not just?talking?about freight lanes and you’re actually hauling freight to new customers, you need to?learn everything you can about both the freight lanes and the customers.?

Driving new freight lanes is great because you’ll see new parts of the country, but it also requires you to remember your safety training and slow down. You never know what’s around the next corner. Use extreme caution and watch for signs indicating if you can legally drive on that road.?

It’s crucial that you plan your trips as a driver in your first year at a new company. A GPS system like Google Maps is routing a car, not a semi-truck. It’ll get you there, but it will not get you where your truck needs to be. Google Maps might take you through a town with low bridges or roads with weight restrictions that you cannot be on.?

This is the time when you need to?pick up the phone and call the customer.?Ask the customer how the building is set up, what street you need to turn down and how you need to pull up.?

Depending on whether you’re driving a flatbed trailer or a van, you will have a specific spot you need to be. They will have specific requirements for you dependent upon the type of freight you’re hauling and the type of trailer it’s on.?

Look at a satellite view of the customer site and compare it to their notes. Make notes on the map.?

If you’re a specialized driver, you may be routed to the middle of a cornfield or to a busy construction site in a huge city. Without calling the customer first, you can end up waiting at the site for hours for someone to turn up (like in the scenario we mentioned earlier).?

Failing to make a customer happy has the potential to get you removed from delivering to them ever again.?You can be banned from a customer for being late for a delivery or by being disrespectful. As a driver, it’s your job to treat the customer with respect and to cater to them. They should treat you with equal respect

By Clyde Lewis?- Aden Logistics