By Fello Logistics
It’s almost hard to believe this is a problem that anyone needs to solve, but situations like this are one of the reasons we founded Fello Logistics.
A California-based auto dealer came to us about a year ago with a curious problem: The brokers who arranged for the hauling of their cars would become completely unresponsive for long periods of time during transport.
The dealer would want an update on the location of the cars being hauled, or the likely ETA for delivery. He would contact the broker for an update, only to find that the broker seemed to be avoiding the calls.
“It was ridiculous,” he told us. “The only time this broker wouldn’t talk to me was when I had cars in transport and something didn’t appear to be going according to plan. That was exactly when I would call looking for information, and suddenly this otherwise-reachable broker would let everything go to voicemail.”
It turned out, in most such cases, the broker was either trying to track down the carrier or dealing with some sort of issue with the tracking technology that was putting the carrier out of the broker’s visibility.
But until the broker had good news, he would not answer the dealer’s calls or call the dealer back.
The dealer came to Fello with a simple request: “Whether the news is good or bad, would you just tell me what’s going on?”
Of course.
We always have and we always will. This is so fundamental it’s hard to believe it needs to be said. Shippers may not want to hear that there’s a problem, but the thing that gives them the most anxiety is when they have no idea what’s going on and no one will tell them.
Many Fello clients will tell you they’ve never had a problem with shipping their goods since they’ve been working with us. That’s because we vet our carriers carefully and we know which ones we can trust. And of course, because we keep in close communication with everyone in the process until the goods have been delivered.
But for goodness sakes, this is logistics. Things do go wrong. When someone is behind schedule or a detail isn’t exactly what was expected, what our clients want us to do is explain what’s happening and how we’re going to make it right. They don’t want us to ignore their calls or pretend nothing has happened.
So the way we solve this problem is actually pretty simple. We brought in new carriers who have a proven track record of dependability and great communication. And every time we broker a load for this dealer, we keep in close contact with them. In fact, they have very rarely had to reach out to us with a question, because before they can do that, we reach out to them and let them know what’s going on.
And not just with automated notifications. We call them. We talk directly to the drivers so we can give our clients accurate updates. And if things are not going as planned, we come up with solutions to try and get them back on track.
Really. This is not that difficult. It’s the right way to do things.
Fello Logistics is known for integrity, reliability, industry-leading customer service and genuine care for it’s clients. Learn more about our freight shipping services.
