Carriers have a tough job seeing freight makes it to destination without incident. Getting loaded at the shipper is one stop along the way that should be seamless. So what happens when a driver knows they have been overloaded by the shipper and there's an attempt to get the driver on the road anyway?
The responsibility of safely transporting goods in the United States rests on the shoulders of an estimated 3.5 million truck drivers. All of those drivers are trying to maximize their loads and minimize the amount of time spent running to scales and avoiding weigh stations.
It's one of those situations: you've been driving hundreds of miles, you haven't had a chance to stop to eat, and an officer with the Department of Transportation has just handed you a citation for being overloaded.
If you have been driving a truck for any amount of time then you have probably found yourself overloaded at some point. Shippers are moving more cargo faster than ever and many times it is the driver that has to deal with the consequences. With weight limits and road restrictions it's hard for drivers to know how much they are actually hauling. Trying to figure out how much a truck weighs is a job itself. Mechanical pressure gauges read different from trailer to trailer and trying to remember calibrations is almost impossible. If a driver finds out they are overweight the whole day can be wasted trying to fix the issue. Below are some of the cost that are hidden when being overloaded.
In a perfect world, every truck would be filled to capacity on every run. Shippers would always have a door open when drivers arrived, and trucks would be loaded quickly and evenly every time. You’d never have to worry about things like axle-weights, and the only bears in the woods would be looking for picnic baskets.