BCTA warns against hiring cheap truckers

VANCOUVER — Want cheap freight movers? Buy at your own risk.

That’s the message from the B.C. Trucking Association, whose leader took an opportunity recently to educate the province’s citizens and shippers on the perils of hiring truckers solely on price.

In an op-ed printed by the Vancouver Sun, BCTA president Paul Landry writes that for shippers, often the only — or primary — factor that closes the deal is price and that could be costly.

Anecdotally, Landry tells of a story where a shipper called him, upset that a truck driver in his yard failed to back a trailer up to the loading bay after umpteen tries and 45 minutes. The deed was eventually done by a skilled driver from a rival trucking company.

Landry’s answer to the caller was that only he and other shippers could solve that type of problem by being more concerned about the qualifications of companies they hire.

“Minimizing costs and outselling the competition is important. I get that,” he adds. “But safety, quality service and hiring a reputable company should trump cost-cutting.”

As Landry points out, it costs money to buy a truck, maintain it, hire skilled professionals, and invest in ongoing safety training. As well, trucking companies are subject to countless safety regulations governing things like drivers’ hours of work, load security and vehicle standards.

“The vast majority of companies follow these rules and the government is supposed to enforce the rules for the few that don’t,” says Landry. “But ‘few’ is relative in a province that has well over 20,000 trucking companies. With shrinking budgets, government is less able to monitor the bad apples in the trucking industry.

“That’s why shippers must play their part in supporting safe trucking companies by asking the right questions: What are your professional driver hiring standards and monitoring practices? What is your carrier safety plan? How do you maintain your vehicles? How do you monitor the number of hours your drivers work each day? How much and what types of insurance does your company carry? What is your company’s speed enforcement policy and how is it monitored?”

Reputable companies can and will supply answers to these questions, Landry adds. 

The whole article can be read here.