Hi Guys. New to Forum. Can anyone tell me if WH Malcolm use sub contractors (OD’s) to haul their containers out of railhead in Scotland and what rate. Same question for Medite containers or can anyone give me any info on these companies.
probably a pound a mile , thats what most other container jobs want to pay subbies, why anybody would want to go down that route is beyond me
not trying to be negative mate, but i just dont see the attraction to containers as a o/d
Hmmmmm! I am planning to go back to driving after a 14 year lay off and set up as an OD! (Must be mad I hear you say!!) What would you suggest I target for subbing?
Angiey:
Hmmmmm! I am planning to go back to driving after a 14 year lay off and set up as an OD! (Must be mad I hear you say!!) What would you suggest I target for subbing?
Is it April 1st already?
chaversdad:
probably a pound a mile , thats what most other container jobs want to pay subbies,
they can’t pay more than that otherwise you wouldn’t make them a fat profit 
any one know the difference between much the companies charge and how much they pay a subbie 
at the risk of sounding like Rob 
, most companies use subbies because it’s cheaper than putting their own truck on the road 
I sub work out at busy times, I always take a cut for setting it up and I’m sure when the same hauliers give me work they’re doing the same !
Angiey:
Hi Guys. New to Forum. Can anyone tell me if WH Malcolm use sub contractors (OD’s) to haul their containers out of railhead in Scotland and what rate. Same question for Medite containers or can anyone give me any info on these companies.
You won’t make any money on boxes or tilts unless you run bent, I’ll tell you that for nowt.
Does that mean most subbies rates are about the pound mark or are some contracts worth more hauling different things. It was just to get things rolling and then hopefully find own account customers.
Angiey:
Does that mean most subbies rates are about the pound mark or are some contracts worth more hauling different things.
That’s a bit like asking “how long is a piece of string”. It’s not long ago that Curries were advertising 95p/mile in Commercial Motor, which is one end of the scale. At the other end of the scale there are some jobs that work out at over £2/mile. Some stuff will also work out a lot more than that due to them being short runs where the time is more the cost that the distance.
Paul
I’VE FOUND THROUGH BITTER EXPERIENCE WITH CONTAINERS THAT THE FURTHER YOU GO FROM BASE THE LESS PROFITABLE IT IS.
MARITIME AT LEEDS ARE OFFERING £1300 G.TEE ON LOCALS, MOST JOBS ARE VERY SHORT TRIPS AND WORK OUT IN EXCESS OF £1.85/MILE, YOU’RE NOT GOING TO PAY FOR THAT NEW 620 BUT IF YOU WANT A LIVING AND TO SEE YOUR OWN COT OF AN EVENING YOU COULD DO WORSE…TRUST ME…I’VE DONE WORSE!!
I WOULDN’T CONDONE ANYONE ACTUALLY SETTING UP AS AN o/d AND LOOKING TO GET INTO BOXSHIFTING, IT’S WHAT WE DO WHEN THE PROVERBIAL GOES THROUGH THE FAN UNTIL BETTER WORK COMES UP.
DON’T MEAN TO BE NEGATIVE ABOUT YOUR FETISH, BUT JUST think VERY LONG AND VERY HARD BECAUSE CONTAINER COMPANIES TALK THE TALK BUT WHEN IT MATTERS THEY WILL SXXT ON YOU FROM A GREAT HEIGHT.
HAPPY NEW YEAR
i personally price an outward job @ £2 a mile and 98% of the time i get a backload @ about £1.50 a mile, but then i,m supplying my customer with a 17k trailer as well, you do need to find a niche market to make money at this game
come on then rob lets hear it
Angiey:
Does that mean most subbies rates are about the pound mark or are some contracts worth more hauling different things. It was just to get things rolling and then hopefully find own account customers.
trouble is, by the time you do get things rolling you,ve usually run out of money 
DO THE ABOVE, WITH PENSION SCHEME, 5 WEEKS HOLS AND OTHER BENEFITS THEN GIGGLE HYSTERICALLY NEXT TIME YOU PASS ONE OF US NUMPTYS WAITING 6 HOURS AT TESCO. 
madders:
DO THE ABOVE, WITH PENSION SCHEME, 5 WEEKS HOLS AND OTHER BENEFITS THEN GIGGLE HYSTERICALLY NEXT TIME YOU PASS ONE OF US NUMPTYS WAITING 6 HOURS AT TESCO.
That has got to be the best reply so far 
Heres the scenario. Say you had a wagon paid for. FH12 with 500K on clock, reliable ex OD wagon and 30k disposable £’s. Would you still give it a go? I realise that someone who has been doing the job for years might not be as enthusiastic as someone coming in fresh, (No disrespect to anyone intended)as in my job I am about as enthusiastic as I can be but it is hard sometimes. I need a change and a new challenge. I have been looking at other business interests but keep coming back to this crazy idea of becoming an OD. I already have my CPC’s National and Inteernational which I gained a few years ago so what do you think?
point is this, weather the wagons paid for or not or weather it’s a year old, or ten years old makes no odds, personally i found the cheapest wagon i ran was the newest (53 mega) not by any big margin but still the cheapest over a period of time not least because i suffered no downtime with it where as i lost a lot of work (money) with older wagons i’d had before.
the job either pays or it dosn’t i.e a decent reliable wagon on the road plus a trailer, taking into account tyres, servicing, o’center etc you want a decent wage (i reckoned on £600 a week) plus the all important profit, now everyone will have a different idea on that but to me if your laying out 4k+ a month to do the job i wanted £400 a week profit for a total of 1k per week as a bare minimum pre tax, this allows for the fact that your not going to be working much more than say 46 weeks a year ,if that.
the latest fuel hikes meant those figures were going to be hard to achieve in the future which is why i bailed out to do something else. as a guide i was charging £2+ a mile out and £1.50+ back, obviously it depends on the type of work as to how many miles you can achieve in one week, i was averaging 1300 a week with no nights out simply because thats how the job was with restricted loading and tipping times each day.
as for boxes? in my eyes the subbies are being taken to the cleaners with ridiculously low rates and fuel surcharges not being passed on, for example called to see the boss of a local yard before christmas who sells stone paving which he imports from india via felixstowe delivered in boxes, invoice for two containers carried a fuel surcharge of £112 how much of that will be passed onto the subbies who actually did the job?
Thanks for that Paul B. Useful info and I can see where you are coming from.
As far as I can see with the container companies, they all know exactly how much it costs to run the truck, then they guarantee you that money each week, Its a big carrot and a donkey situation.
I will say no more on the subject, except the guarantee will be just that, you won’t earn a living, or god forbid any profit
Medite - who are calling themselves MSC these days, incidentally - are a shipping line. Whilst AFAIK they run a few of their own trucks, most of their work is contracted out. Therefore you can either approach them direct (which is always best, as no-one else is taking a piece of the pie) or sub through one of their Contract Hauliers.
They have an office down Felixstowe/Ipswich way somewhere if you want to look them up, then the Contract Hauliers will be locally based for whatever area they are doing. Bulmers pull a lot for them, amongst others. Knowing what rate Bulmers do some of their other work for, I’d say that no-one is getting rich, mind. Not even on spot hire.
mmmh boxes, yer you can make a living at it ok for time etc you sit waiting tipping etc it gets a bit much esp were demurage is paid after 3 hrs only,and most tips/loads are done with in just the 3hrs “aaargh” then as we are, in leeds queing in the hole of holes f/liner somedays upto 4 hrs to tip and turn!!! for no extra charge,so you lose just in f/liner queing around 2 days in man hours alone, if you can find somewhere what can give you 3 local jobs a day you will be doing ok ish,
i did for example just before xmas “now this is taking a big profit out of the job!!!”"
load a box at haz box in bradford down to tilbury part tip and re load then to southampton this was 2 days work so far!
box out of souhthampton to tip next day at washington empty to leeds that bloody lot paid a shead load of NOTHING for 3 days work,
now for the best bit,. got a very good pal in felistowe who runs a big haulage company well he is the manager of the company, spoke to him and he has a realation in the shipping companys office i was doing the box for via the guy who subbies the work to me the guy who subbies the work to me,ge had a word with is family member and was told the correct rate for both jobs,my pal then told me the rates of these jobs and this is what the guy took of me £207.00 of the down trip, and £164.00 of the job back, talk about having ya pants down!!! 1 thing for sure i wont be doing that again,make no mistake. but loacl we make half decent money, daz
Thank you all very much for your replies Much appreciated. It has given me food for thought and at least now I know a bit of what is going on on the front line!