Bankruptcy of Trucking Companies
The threshhold issue in the bankruptcy of a trucking company is the trucks.
If the bankruptcy is a Chapter 11 - a reorganization - the primary goal will often be either the renegotiation of the debts on the trucks or the adjustment of the secured claims of the lenders to where their secured claims are equal to the actual fair market value of the trucks.
Inevitably, in the bankruptcy of a trucking company, there will be trucks that are no longer profitable, but are still owed on. Like the retailer who has too much stock that is not moving, these trucks, and the notes on them, can spell the end of a trucking business. The owner should take careful stock early on of what is owed and how much so that if the end comes, he can get his own discharge without 1) the lenders alleging that they were misled or 2) IRS wanting payment on employment taxes because the owner chose to pay American Express instead.
Issue
Like the contractor whose bidder underbids, the achille's heel of the trucking business is often the dispatcher. If you are running a trucking business and you can't place your finger on the problem, look first to your dispatcher. The dispatcher is often the key to recovery or the reason for failure because the efficiency of the movement of the freight is in his hands. Speaking of hands, you may want to make sure that one of his is not in the till.
Charles Chesnutt