Demurrage And Detention

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

Harry :  That 700 to 800  dollar demurrage bill of texas Gulf Sulphur is pure
chickenfeed when you consider a customer we had on Southern Railway
here in Gainesville with the name Cargill, Inc.   Soybeans shipped to Cargill
in unit trains under contract means that the covered hoppers are on what is
called 24 hour detention, or only one  day's free time.  BUt check this. No
matter how many cars Cargill has  backed up waiting to be unloaded, when
a car of soybeans arrives, it is "Constructfully Placed"  on 24 hour detention
at the first 7:00 AM after the day it arrives.  "Constructive Placement" means
that the customer is in no position to unload the car, but the railroad has
the ability to place the car although the customer has no room for the car
to be spotted.  Check this out.  We did a large interchange business with
CSX  ( the old GM  )  In the Fall during soybean season, we would have
cars of soybeans reported to us by CSX that  had arrived in Athens, Ga.
and were on the CSX yard in Athens, and not even been brought to
Gainesville for the lack of yard space.  Although those cars of soybeans
were still 40 miles from Gainesville they had already been "Constructifully
Placed" on Cargill's 24 hour detention.  Cargill paid  thousands of dollars
every month in detention charges and simply considered it a part of doing
business.  What they were doing was paying Southern Railway  to "store"
the soybeans until they could get around to unloading them.  It was our
  ( the railroad's ) responsibility to place the oldest soybeans  first  on
Cargill's unloading tracks.  Thery had room to place only 18  cars for
unloading soybeans, 9 cars on each track.   The other two tracks were for
loading outbound covered hoppers with soybean meal and soybean hulls,
and the oil track for loading outbound soybean oil  in tank cars.   THey
had the option of ordering in which empty tank cars they wanted to load with
soybean oil.  The last car I billed out on the day I retired was a tank car
of soybean oil going to Frito-Lay somewhere in  Texas,.  The freight bill
on that car of oil was over  $ 1,800.00.    It was called "Hydrogenated
Soybean Oil."    When it comes to demurrage and detention, I have
"Been There, Done That."    Same with Order Notify cars, and  cars that
are subject to "Transit Rates."    Bill Sellers.