Bit of advice needed on the subject please … Ive been offered an opportunity by a member of my family who has a farm in the east of england to do all his bulk grain haulage and that of a co op that hes in . I understand the o licence procedure and have an operating centre based on his farm so no probs there . At present im living down south mainly working on air freight imports and our rates are based on mileage 90% of the time . What i need to know from you in the know is is it better to charge by weight in relation to distance or as ill be running at full weight the majority of the time a mile rate ? Ive tried to make enquiries with bulk hauliers based in other areas of the country after explaining the situation but they are obviously pretty cagey ( and who can blame them ? ) as they would think i may be a local competitor . Any other advice will be gratefully received such as availability of back loads as i would be delivering to ports nationwide by the sounds of things
Dragging back thru my brain cells - bulk work is all done a weight basis - when I was costing it - we worked out the mileage for the trip and then new the average load and worked out a cost per tonne from there.
ie. 25t load 100 miles x £1 per mile = £4 / per tonne.
I know now there is problems with back loads if you are doing farm work to food/feed chain and want to back load say sand. I cannot remember to name of the regs that cover it movement of cereals.
I know one load haulier around here that does both cereals and gravel etc and he has ½ his fleet set up for food work and the other ½ for gravels.
Back loading is OK if you get the same type of product in the trailer - we used to take grain / oil seed ■■■■ etc into mills and back load wheetfeed.
When doing grain you will need a “grain passport” which is paperwork listing the load details and the vehicle details.
I am a little rusty on this as its about 10 years since I did the work.
thanks for that mr biker , the rates is my biggest worry about the offer at the minute although a large slice of the work will be for my relative but im sure you know how tight these ‘poor’ farmers are !! Ive still got to put a detailed business plan in front of them so any more advice from you or anyone else reading this will be gratefully received as ive just about had enough of the horseshoe at heathrow and all those other lovely cargo companies around there !
all bulk work is priced by the ton, heres a link to the carriage of foodstuffs website, tells you all you need to know on how to register for carrying foodstuffs agindustries.org.uk/content. … 0Assurance%
Your biggest problem from the very start (and believe me I know ) is that you will be working for Farmers who are THE most tight fisted with money you will EVER come across.
Guys on here talk about companies paying on 30/60 or even the total madness 90 days.
Well with Farmers you may well be looking at 300 day payment terms
funny you should say that … i was in a pub last sat and overheard a local farmer and his wife discussing with someone they knew how bad farming was at the minute … imagine my surprise when i saw them getting in a 59 plate range rover 10 mins later
LouthInTheSouth:
funny you should say that … i was in a pub last sat and overheard a local farmer and his wife discussing with someone they knew how bad farming was at the minute … imagine my surprise when i saw them getting in a 59 plate range rover 10 mins later
lol yeah it kind of defeats what they sayin when you see that, at least they get subsidy money too help them as the haulage industry hets nothing
As others have said bulk work is almost always priced by the tonne. Local work tends to be priced at a level that allows you to make money without worrying about backloads but if you’re going any distance then in order to be competitive you’ll need to be able to find something to get you back home as the rates that are offered will rarely be good enough to allow you to run back empty.
If you’re going to be running for an existing coop it might be an idea to see if they will tell you how much they are paying at the moment for their haulage to give you some kind of an idea of pricing.
As far as backloads are concerned if you’re mainly running to ports then the first thing to investigate is going to be loading imported feedstuffs back to animal feed mills. The big one here is soya meal but there’s plenty of other stuff that comes in too. Sometimes you might also be able to find loads of imported wheat to flour mills too.
Ive just come off doing 12 months of distance bulk work. (and all youll be doing is putting plenty of diesel in)
Although the rate is paid per tonne it is actually set from the start by mileage.
They know from the start that they only want to pay £1.50 - £1.80 ppm loaded miles outbound so they work the £ per tonne from the ppm. where as local quarry work wil be about £2.80 loaded miles.
the job is no good with too much unpaid waiting time involved and now the cowboys from Ireland are doing the job but not running to Ukasta rules.
I saw one of the mentioned brushing out glass in a lay-by and rolled up 5 mins behind me at a farm to load osr. and he could talk some bull [zb] like having to share a reversing camera with 4 other wagons to go in a quarry. cowboys.
the only thing that made me feel smug was he was only going to get 28 tonnes on where my old girl could carry 30T.
dozer:
the only thing that made me feel smug was he was only going to get 28 tonnes on where my old girl could carry 30T.
And that is the key for bulk work. That extra 2t will equate to 150-200quid a week in extra earnings which can easily be the difference between profit and loss. Forget about the big glory boy wagons and get something small and light to get you started and you’ll have the best possible chance of it working out.
BUT dont buy one of them lightweight man’s or erf cos it will never be out of the workshop,then that will be the end of you.as repton says you can carry a extra ton but i’d sooner have something more reliable thats not going to cost a fortune in repairs,you could go for a r-cabbed scania & a stas trailer & you will be round the 29 ton mark.
164480:
BUT dont buy one of them lightweight man’s or erf cos it will never be out of the workshop,then that will be the end of you.as repton says you can carry a extra ton but i’d sooner have something more reliable thats not going to cost a fortune in repairs,you could go for a r-cabbed scania & a stas trailer & you will be round the 29 ton mark.
andy.
Or go for a Premium and a Kel-Berg and you will be around the 30/31t mark
havnt really gone into any real depth for a particular truck yet as been more concerned with the economics of the business and the red tape etc involved but was thinking along the lines of a 460 hp , tag axle . Ive seen a unit that fits that bill with tipping gear about 8.5 tonne weight or should i be looking for a lighter unit ?
We do alot of work into feed mills with tankers so are not thankfully waiting to tip but at 90% of the mills a lot of the tipper men are waiting to tip at least 1-1 1/2 hours. Youll see just about every sort of combination going form the old school driver with his cf and frauhauf to the o/d with his mega space and merc axled kelberg all polished up. We have run a 450 Premium and a Kelberg recently and get a payload of 30400 which on the cut throat grain job aint bad.
I agree with whats been said above, that most if not all bulk work is paid by the load apart from very light bulk material which is normally paid by the load but the load rate is only a reflection of what a full load at a tonnage rate would be anyway.
Go for a light combination, like a Renault & Fruehauf which weigh around 14.5 - 15 tonne or CF Daf or MAN (if you can keep it out of the garage ?)
Out of interest we had a 2 x brand new FH with Fruehaufs in our place last weekthey weighed around 15.6 t each.
) is that you will be working for Farmers who are THE most tight fisted with money you will EVER come across.
