Accessorial charges in land transportation in USA

When you receive the rates for any drayage service the times you have worked either with a Freight Forwarder or a trucking company in the United States, you may have noted that there are some charges named as accessorial charges, which can normally cause some confusion and lead you to think: What does each of these accessorial charges mean and when could I be charged for each of them? Well, it is exactly for this reason that we want to clearly provide you an explanation about what does each of those charges mean and when they could apply in order to give you a better understanding about how drayage services operate and when each charge could apply.

First, let’s define what a drayage is. Drayage is a service generally used in exports and imports, where the containers used to transport the cargo are own by ocean carriers. Those containers are normally stored at container depots/terminals distributed throughout the country. Then, in the case of the exports, the drayage service consists of the entire operation executed by the trucking company from pulling the empty container from the forementioned depots, taking it to the exporter’s warehouse to load it, and transporting the container back to the export terminal/port. In the case of imports, the drayage consists of pulling the full container from the import terminal, taking it to the importer’s warehouse to discharge it, and transporting the empty container back to the container depot/terminal.

Now that we have a better understanding about what a drayage service is, let’s explore what are the most common accessorial charges you could pay for and when they could apply. They are called ‘accessorial charges’ as they are additional services that a trucker can provide you when the main service (Drayage) is being executed, depending on the needs of the operation. The most common accessorial charges are the prepull, chassis split (or split alone), storage, detention, overweight, hazmat, among others. Have you ever heard about them? Well, let’s explore them one by one:

PREPULL
For exports, the prepull happens when the empty container must be pulled from the terminal one day before the loading appointment with the shipper. For imports, this happens when the full

container must be pulled from the terminal one day before the unloading appointment with the shipper.

This may be needed for different factors. The most common situation is when the loading appointment is so early in the morning so that the trucker cannot pull the empty container from the terminal that same day. However, this could also happen either when the distance between the terminal where the empty container is pulled from and the shipper is so long or when the terminal is so congested, as none of both situations would allow the trucker to arrive at the shipper’s warehouse on time regardless the appointment is early in the morning or not.

For this reason, prepull is required for some movements to comply with planned schedules and to avoid any backlogs that may affect the normal and smooth flow of transport.