With trucking capacity tight, trucking no-show risk is elevated.

Follow these tips to minimize the impact of trucking no-shows on your operation:

• Estimate total number of no-show trucks for a given lineup
  • Use statistics!
  • Factor in causal variables (day/night, holiday proximity, mobilization distance)
• Categorize drivers by no-show probability
  • Keep it simple - high, low to start
• Estimate impact of no-show trucks by job
  • Number of trucks (lower = more impact due to relative production impact)
  • Mobilization distance (higher = more impact due to difficulty of replacement)
  • Planned duration (longer = higher impact due to higher marginal cost)
  • Other consequences (additional days, customer satisfaction, damages)
• Assign high-risk drivers to jobs with the lowest no-show impact
  • Distribute risk through trucker assignment as possible
  • Communicate to truckers re: assignment strategy given no-show probability
    • Don’t assign flakey drivers to high-impact jobs
    • Don’t assign flakey driver together
    • Assign flakey drivers to later shifts in the rotation
• Follow-up with high-risk drivers post assignment
  • Contact them directly to reinforce assignment and encourage communication
• Dispatch an insurance pool based the expected number of no-show trucks
  • The ideal insurance truck is flexible, centrally-located, and versatile
  • Consider starting insurance trucks on stockpiling if centrally located and flexible
  • Communicate to the trucker and driver about their role
• Communicate to planners re: insurance strategy and need for accurate plans
  • No local insurance decisions
  • No local rationing decisions
• Schedule time to assess the impact of no-shows and re-dispatch accordingly
  • Leverage no-show impact estimates
  • Consider mobilization costs
  • Consider updated job production plan details
• Assess no-show management performance each day and adjust accordingly
  • How accurate were no-show estimates?
  • Was risk distributed to the lowest cost places?
  • Were replacements managed optimally?

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