Brokered Load and the term Exclusive use? What's it mean?

Most places I would guess would seal the load. If, once at the receiver, the seal is broken the load will be rejected.
But yes, other than that it will be specified in the contract. If there are no penalties in the contract, the worst that can happen is said broker will not work with you again.

 

It doesn't happen very often with flatbed but here is how it goes.
You can do whatever you want with your own truck and trailer. The broker doesn't own 2 cents into your business. I've done it before without a problem.

 

I’ve done it a few times but it’s not common. If they book exclusive use and it only uses 10 ft of my flatbed I will look for a partial. I however make sure it won’t delay delivery of the exclusive load and I make sure the partial load gets unloaded first. If nothing is quick I won’t bother with a partial.

 

Some contracts specifically are bid as “Truckload” rates where the customer states that no other freight is to be hauled on the truck regardless of weight and amount of trailer used. The contract usually says what the repercussions are of not sticking to the terms of “exclusive use”. It could include termination of the contract or such things as being barred from a particular traffic lane.

For dry Van/reefer Loads, seals usually keep people honest, for flatbed loads there obviously isn’t much of a way to control it. Sure it’s easy enough to sneak another partial on and off of the trailer without anyone knowing but I guess you have to ask yourself if the extra money is worth loosing a customer (direct or broker) over it. Best case if someone finds out about it they tell you not to do it again or won’t use you on a particular load. Worst case you or someone loading your truck damages the other freight on the trailer and now you have a claim, plus you probably lose the the work in the future as well.

As a broker if I have a small load that is exclusive use, I will make sure I put a note of it on the rate con and spell out the repercussions of non compliance. Obviously everyone is free to do what they wish, but at least they’ll have been warned. If I find out you violated the terms, most likely I won’t use you again, as it will have most likely damaged the customer relationship. I’m not a big one for trying to fine people as that can add a lot of non value added time to my day, but I supposed others may try to do that.

 

If they don’t seal it. Go for it. Just don’t say anything stupid like asking the broker if you can put something else on it. Most brokers these days want to track your truck so they might get suspicious if you go out of route

 

You charge full load rate for a partial, that's all. They want to pay full load rate for 10k pounds that's fine with me.

 

I know that used to be what the old man would do, you get a full load going one way and then pick up a bunch of different partials to another full load. It's nice when that works but then one gets yanked out from under you and you're looking around going WTF do I put with all this now?