Four Myths of Dedicated Fleet Management
Answering The Myths of Dedicated Fleet Management
Many companies believe that outsourcing their transportation means giving up decisions that impact their business. With the J.B. Hunt Dedicated Contract Services® team, that couldn’t be further from the truth. We give you more power over your fleet management than ever before.
Making the choice to outsource your fleet is a big decision. While it’s scary to feel like you’re relinquishing control of your fleet, we’ve found a lot of that apprehension is based on misinformation about what it means to outsource. These are misconceptions we hear most often and how we’re addressing them:
Myth: We want to make sure this is done right, so we have to do it ourselves.
We know our drivers are the face of your company. They interact with customers directly, which is why we hold them to high standards of customer service. Your customers will receive the same amount of care from us that a private fleet would provide.
Many companies believe their transportation needs are too specialized for anyone else to manage, but for most of those companies, transportation is not their core competency. When you outsource your transportation to the right provider, you’re handing your fleet over to someone whose priority is designing and executing custom fleet strategies for specialized companies like yours.
For instance, a medical supply customer started experiencing high demand. This required rearranging delivery schedules to meet resource needs at the 30 healthcare facilities they serviced, as well as sourcing the extra trailers to meet the increased demand.
As a dedicated fleet provider, we possessed the expertise and manpower to quickly pivot operations and consolidate these new routes into a schedule that produced cost savings for the customer. We could also leverage our contacts and asset resources to quickly source the extra trailers they needed at their contract rate instead of them finding a third-party carrier to meet capacity.
Myth: Outsourcing will cause us to lose our decision-making rights.
One reason some companies don’t outsource is because they’re scared they will lose the ability to make decisions for their fleet. With our dedicated trucking contracts, you will always be able to make decisions about where and how to meet your customers’ demands. We allow flexibility to keep your customers happy.
In fact, you gain more control and insight into your operations than ever before. With our integrated technology, we’re able to increase visibility to give you more control. We can create customized solutions to get more from your fleet without creating extra costs. We can also provide an on-site account manager to handle your daily pain points like keeping driving teams fully staffed. The account manager helps handle the day-to-day tasks of managing a fleet so you can focus on your core business.
Myth: If we outsource, our current drivers will lose their jobs.
Safe drivers will always remain in high demand, and we make it our goal to retain as many existing drivers as possible during a fleet’s transition. After all, these drivers are already familiar with your routes, your customers and your product. When they transition to J.B. Hunt, they keep their jobs while gaining access to ongoing training.
In fact, J.B. Hunt’s scale helps provide opportunities for sharing drivers between accounts. When you have excess capacity, drivers can be “loaned” to other jobs until you need them again. When their normal volume rate resumes, those drivers will return to their account. Arrangements like this can save you money while helping your drivers get paid even when your volume is low. In the end, you can retain the quality drivers you need—and their connection to your customers—while releasing many of the responsibilities that come with employing drivers.
Myth: We can’t afford to outsource our fleet.
When you own and manage your own fleet, you also hold all the risk associated with your fleet. If one of your trucks is involved in an accident, your company could be on the line. If your supply chain is disrupted, you must piece it together. You may be stuck with empty trailers and excess drivers when volume is low or scramble with the spot market to get extra capacity when you need it. So, it becomes a question of can you afford not to outsource?
When you allow us to manage your private fleet, we help take some of the responsibility for the risks involved with your fleet. We’re able to adapt quickly to the evolving market, based on your needs, to save you time and money. So, when problems arise, you can keep the focus on managing your business’s bottom line while we take care of the rest.
Learn more about trusting J.B. Hunt with your fleet today. Fill out our form now to get started.