Freight - The Wonderful World of Freight

submitted: Oct 19th 2007 | by: FrankDunne | Total views: 13 | Word Count: 694 | |

The world of freight and shipping is an exciting and very broad field of activity. Whether you are thinking of becoming a shipper, a broker, or planning on shipping something yourself, there is a lot to learn.

Freight is a term employed to classify the movement of commodities and is commonly a commercial process. Items are for the most part listed into various shipment categories before they are sent.

Things to consider are:

The type of item being sent, i.e. a kettle would usually be put into the family 'household goods'.

- Numbers and sizes of objects to be shipped.

- How long the item for sending will be in transit.

- Shipments are ordinarily noted as household goods, express, parcel, and freight items.

Fine art, furniture items, and such things will normally be reffered to as household goods.

Very small business or personal shipments like envelopes are counted as overnight express or express letter goods. These shipments are rarely over a few pounds, and just about always go in the carriers own packaging. Service grades are variable, based on the shippers choice.

Depending on the service levels chosen, an envelope for example can travel overnight or could take days to get to it's destination. Avaition is nearly always used for Express goods to speed delivery.

Parcel or ground dispatches is the name given to bigger items such as small boxes. Weighing less than 50Kg, and with no single item over 35Kg. Boxing is the normal choice for these shipments, sometimes the shipper does this and at other times the carrier provides the boxes.

The majority of business-to-consumer shipments are parcels. Normally they travel by rail and road, and seldom by air. Depending again on the service levels chosen, delivery times will vary, but most loads will travel 550-750 miles per day.

Aside from Household goods and Parcels, the next catagories are described as "freight".

1. The first class is Less-than-truckload or LTL freight:

The requirements for packaging and size are very similar for air freight and for LTL cargo. Generally the Less-than-truckload LTL carriers use a 28 foot container. Air freight shipments typically need to move at much faster speeds than 500 miles per day. Air shipments may be booked directly with the carriers or through brokers or online marketplace services. Air shipments move faster than standard LTL.

2. TL - Truckload freight:

For larger loads of 7,500Kg and more, it makes more sense to dedicate one full truck rather than to share as with LTL loads. Truckloads (TL), are catagorised in the US as being above that weight of 15,000 pounds.

A full truck is limited to the amount of weight that a unit can legally carry by the difference between 80,000 pounds and the weight of the tractor trailer. Increasing shipment size has proven to be a significant opportunity for many companies - particularly large consumer product companies.

Consolidating orders onto the truck using a Transportation management system is one way to increase the load within the limits. Here the optimal combination of orders and stops can be used to fill out the truck. Also constructing the trucks with lighter materials can bring great savings. When sending cargo, it is exceedingly crucial to know about pricing, claims, and insurance.

Freight pricing:

LTL rates are quoted per 100 pounds or cwt or per hundred weight. Besides the discount off of base rate created by the freight class, there is typically a second discount applied to the calculated transportation rate.

These discounts are negotiated by the shipper with individual LTL carriers. For example, a given LTL lane may have a rate of $50 cwt. If a shipment is 1,000 lbs at class 70, then the adjusted base rate is $35 cwt (70% of 50 cwt) or $350. If the hypothetical shipper had negotiated a 50% discount on published tarrif rates, this would give a final price of $175 for the shipment.

Liftgate, residential pickup/delivery, inside pickup/delivery or notifications/appointments charges can also be minimised by picking up deliveries at the carriers terminals.

About the Author

Shipping and freight is an interesting world and is full of possibility for those who are attracted to a real challange. Author Frank Dunne has a information-packed site filled with freight information and useful resources at freight-information.com This and other unique content 'freight' articles are available with free reprint rights.

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