“From a technology point-of-view, Drivewyze offers a much more cutting-edge technology and is increasingly being viewed favorably by law enforcement agencies.”

John Pope, Chairman at Cargo Transporters

Claremont, North Carolina-based Cargo Transporters is a truckload, dry van carrier operating 525 late-model trucks in 48 lower states. While Cargo Transporters specializes in moving freight with specific delivery times and JIT/expedited truckload service on lanes east of the Rocky Mountains from locations in North Carolina and several drop yards in North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia, it also delivers to client locations on the West Coast.

The company provides shippers a complete outsourced transportation solution. In late 2016, the company was one of 43 truck carriers to receive a SmartWay Excellence Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as an industry leader in freight supply chain environmental performance and energy efficiency.

“We take pride in the fact that we operate a fleet that’s as efficient, safe and as environmentally responsible as we can,” said John Pope, chairman of the privately-held Cargo Transporters.

The Problem

Before switching to weigh station bypass service with Drivewyze, Cargo Transporters received bypasses using a transponder-based system, Pope said.

Besides the benefits weigh station bypass provides in reducing operating costs and avoiding delivery delays, it has always been a critical part of the company’s goal of helping drivers avoid the frustrations and potential safety issues related to exiting and entering the highway and to be as efficient as possible by keeping their trucks running on the mainline, he said.

“Driver satisfaction is extremely important in today’s operating environment, keeping a driver moving to fully utilize their ELD driving hours is paramount. That’s why we have a driver retention rate of just under 50 percent, which is pretty darn good in the trucking industry.”

John Pope, Chairman at Cargo Transporters

“We know in today’s market, the only way we can be assured of providing our customers transportation services that consistently get their loads delivered on-time is if we make every effort to maximize driving time for our drivers.” Pope added.

Cargo Transporters is also committed to running an operation that’s fully compliant with CSA and hours-of-service regulations. That’s why the company abandoned paper logs in favor of electronic on-board recorders for hours-of-service compliance, Pope said. The company, which has received a top fleet safety award from the American Trucking Associations (ATA), has three certified directors of safety. In addition, the company’s safety director was named ATA safety director of the year in 2012.

For years, Cargo Transporters provided company drivers much-needed weigh station bypasses using a transponder-based service, allowing drivers to take full advantage of the considerable investment the company commits to safety and training. “Anytime we can avoid having our drivers enter and exit the traffic lane through requests that qualify for weigh station bypasses, the safer it is for the motoring public and for our drivers,” Pope added. But transponder-based service has some disadvantages, chief amount them is that it only works at permanent weigh stations. “Many states such as South Dakota and New York use temporary inspection sites where our drivers just couldn’t get bypasses.”
A few years ago, company officials began noticing the service offered by Drivewyze, Pope said.

“From a technology point-of-view, Drivewyze offers a much more cutting-edge technology and is increasingly being viewed favorably by law enforcement agencies.”

John Pope, Chairman at Cargo Transporters

Pope said he appreciated how quickly Drivewyze added new locations and states and how it works at permanent as well as temporary sites. As Drivewyze worked towards integration with devices offered by the company’s electronic logging device vendor – Omnitracs, it became the more compelling choice, he said.

The Solution

Soon after Omnitracs Weigh Station Bypass Service provided by Drivewyze PreClear became available, Cargo Transporters executives decided to remove the transponder-based weigh station bypass from its fleet of trucks and activate Drivewyze..

“We no longer have to manage and track [transponders], which presented a challenge because our company trucks are based at several different locations.”

John Pope, Chairman at Cargo Transporters

“We had to assign three people to constantly update things with our other weigh station bypass provider. Drivers also expressed some frustrations when roadside transponder readers were not working correctly or when they couldn’t maneuver their trucks for their transponders to be read properly in order to get their bypasses,” Pope said.

The Results

After activating Omnitracs Weigh Station Bypass, Cargo Transporters drivers began receiving bypasses immediately. Because the bypasses were delivered using the ELDs, which were familiar to drivers, they had little difficulty learning how to use the service.

“Our decision to activate Drivewyze is about providing our drivers the tools they need to be as productive and efficient as possible,” Rhines said. “We also want our drivers to be able to take full advantage of our efforts to improve our safety scores. We think Drivewyze provides us that opportunity through a rapidly growing network of locations. We also think our bypass rate more accurately reflects our improving CSA score because Drivewyze accesses the same information and screening rules that commercial vehicle enforcement officers use.”

In their first two weeks with Drivewyze, Cargo Transporters:

• Received 3,900 bypasses
• Saved $36,000 in costs
• Realized a 748% ROI¹

In the first two weeks following activation, Cargo Transporters received 3,900 bypasses out of 4,677 visits to Drivewyze-enabled weigh stations, for a bypass rate of 84 percent. Drivewyze estimates that the 3,900 bypasses saved Cargo Transporters more than $36,000 in potential lost productivity and fuel costs, translating into a 748 percent ROI.

“Drivewyze is right in line with our commitment in providing our drivers with the latest technology to help them increase their drivetime,” Pope said. “We see Drivewyze as the future because of its successful integration with ELDs and because state agencies can deploy it quickly and offer it at their temporary sites.”

¹Using its own study analyzing more than 12 million site visits throughout the United States, Drivewyze has estimated that the average pull-in to a weigh station lasts 3 minutes and 40 seconds and costs, on average, about $9.30 in fuel, maintenance and operational costs. Drivewyze determined the costs using a number of oft-cited national industry reports.