This is a guest post from Toan Nguyen Le, Co-founder of Haul
Trucking in the United States is one of the largest contributors to the U.S. GDP, which contributes to making truck driving one of the most—if not the most—common jobs in the United States.
Like many industries today, trucking suffers from a labor shortage. Churn is a real problem, with drivers changing fleets 10-15 times in their career, costing fleets upwards of $10,000-$15,000 to recruit, qualify and onboard each new CDL driver.
Drivers cite a number of reasons for leaving a fleet, including wanting to spend more time at home, issues with equipment and confusion over how much money they make per job and when they will be paid. On top of churn, there has been a shortage of qualified drivers for many years—a situation made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic and the launch of the Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse—an online database giving employers and government agencies real-time access to information about CDL driver drug and alcohol violations.
Bob Costello, the American Trucking Associations’ chief economist, says trucking is short 80,000 drivers. If the problem is not addressed, ATA data predicts the driver shortage will reach 160,000 by 2030.
Truck Drivers Join the Gig Economy
Former Uber Freight alumni decided to take the best parts of the gig economy—flexibility and transparency—and apply them to the trucking industry. The result of their efforts was Haul, a digital platform connecting trucking companies and their open assignments with pre-vetted, certified drivers. The Haul Platform manages drivers’ credentials and provides them with a profile to move between fleets.
Once a driver is vetted, Haul Certified™ drivers use the Haul Driver app to choose their work assignments from jobs listed by Haul’s fleet partners. The idea is to provide stability and control for the 3 million truck drivers who do not own their own rig.
And same day payments. Haul has created a gig economy payment solution for the trucking and transportation industry using Same Day ACH and Push-to-Debit transfers to offer pay for truckers at all hours of the day. With Dwolla, the benefits of a gig economy payment solution are making their way to the trucking industry—one haul at a time.
How Transportation and Logistics Companies Can Work with Dwolla
Daily Pay for Truck Drivers
After a driver and fleet are matched on an assignment, drivers use the app to check in and out of each job. The Haul app will track earnings and allow drivers to see their earnings data in real-time.
Haul used to pay an hourly rate with weekly settlements to drivers. Now, with InstantPay, drivers can access their wages as soon as they complete a shift instead of waiting until the end of the week. A driver can now login to the Haul app and see the number of hours they expect to work and the pay they expect to receive. Once the hours are approved, payment is transferred to the driver’s bank account in less than 30 minutes.
Many truckers have an immediate need to access the money they earned while driving each day. In other areas of the gig economy, where payment occurs immediately following service, InstantPay has been added to the Haul app. Drivers can access their money as soon as they have completed a shift instead of waiting until the end of each week.
With InstantPay, a driver logs into the Haul app and can see the number of hours they can expect to work alongside the pay they will be receiving for those hours. Once the hours are approved, payment is transferred near instantaneously to the driver’s bank account.
In searching for the right solution, Haul found that getting set up with other payment services could be a cumbersome process.
Not with Dwolla.
The Dwolla integration with InstantPay was straightforward with the help of a well-documented API. The whole process, from initial contact to going live, only took about four weeks. A smooth and efficient integration allowed Haul to launch InstantPay weeks ahead of schedule in 2021.
Haul has become a gig economy payment solution. It’s obvious to us that the employment model in trucking is broken. With help from Dwolla, we’re rethinking how the new generation of truck drivers want to drive, work and get paid.
