Guide To Receiving a Residential Freight Shipment

We ship out a lot of freight shipments to our customers. In fact, most orders ship with a freight carrier due to their size and weight. Receiving a freight shipment is a little bit different than receiving a standard UPS or FedEx ground shipment. Because of this, we decided to create the handy dandy infographic below as a quick guide to receiving a residential freight shipment. We’ve also included some tips at the end, so make sure you check those out as well.

Tips

• The carrier will require that someone is available to receive and sign for the shipment, so when you schedule the delivery appointment, make sure you pick a day that works for you.
• Freight carriers often give you a pretty wide delivery window on the day of the delivery. For example they may say “we’ll be there on Wednesday between 10am and 5pm”. A good way to free yourself up a bit is to ask if the driver can call you when they are about 30 minutes away. That way you can go about your business and ensure you can be back in time to meet them when they call.
• Always check the shipment for obvious damage before you sign for it. In the event that there are damaged parts, make sure you note that on the paperwork that the driver will have you sign, and call us as soon as you have the chance. We’ll want to get those replacement parts headed your way as quickly as we can.
• Be aware of accessibility issues that the driver may face when delivering to your location. They’ll most likely be delivering with a tractor/trailer rig, so if you have a long driveway or the access road to your location isn’t able to accommodate the truck (i.e. – it’s really narrow, up in the mountains, on a dead end with no way to turn around… stuff like that), then they may have to go to a plan B solution. Usually the best option is to meet the driver off the main access road or a nearby parking lot and load it up in a pickup truck that you can then take to your location.