Chances are, your less-than-truckload (LTL) freight carriers will weigh the majority of loads you ship.
This is done for a good reason – money.
Reweigh penalties account for $1 billion, or 3 percent of the revenue for the $32 billion LTL freight industry. When a mismatch in weight is discovered, carriers often charge shippers the weight difference and reweigh charges – from $15 to $25.
Companies that don’t own or use scales – platform or those built into stretch wrappers – to weigh their loads may overestimate or underestimate weight. Estimating weight leads to a load of trouble.
When companies don’t use scales, operators must figure out other ways to estimate the weight of their loads.
For example, operators may estimate the weight by physically lifting pallets or adding up weight of individual parts or products from a computer database. This stored data may or may not be up-to-date, or even close to accurate.
Bottom line – LTL carriers catch most mistakes reported on bills of lading. When you weigh every load, you pay only what you owe and avoid penalties.
This post was published on December 3, 2015 and updated on November 11, 2019.
December 3, 2015
