END OF YEAR #'S; few thoughts for the newbies

[LRT1549]

SquareOne let me preface this by saying I am in no means saying anything about how you do your stuff. However Looking at your expenses per mile they seem low to me. Now I'm nowhere near in the same boat as you. I don't know what you do, what you pull, where you run, or what your maintenance is. But i wonder if your actually truly including everything...

I say this because I have had several conversations with other O/O's that believe they account for every dime they spend on their business, but when I start asking them specifics I find all sorts of things they don't account for.

Now your fuel mileage is great, mine alone is running $0.52 cpm now. However I'm sure you don't run what I do... My truck drives Rawze nuts cause the only thing aerodynamic about it is the swan on the hood. I pull one of the most fuel wasting type trailers and loads there is with a flatbed, and I run 600hp and 2050 torque. Now I drive like most of the guys on this forum and achieve the best mpg I can, but in my case that's just a 6.1 mpg average. But (and this kills Rawze) I don't care.... See even when fuel was $4+ a gallon I still made more than enough profit for my needs. I live in my truck, I own nothing but this truck and trailer and a pick-up that I never drive... In fact today is 7/4/20 I load monday for home which I have not been to since 7/26/19

Also I spend money on this truck constantly both in needed repairs, break downs, and preventative repairs/replacements as the truck is a 2008 with 1.4 million on it.

However, and without knowing you, your equipment, your maintenance regime ect, I wonder if you are indeed accounting for EVERYTHING...

Basically here is what I do... First if I buy anything, and I mean ANYTHING I get a receipt this don't matter if it's personal or business... If I put coins in a pop machine I hand write a receipt, yes that is a little overboard for the most part, but that's me. At the end of the month I literally can balance my books to within cents. But we are talking business expenses here..

Here's one example of things I find with others.. Paper Towels... I find guys that buy a few hundred dollars worth of paper towels every year for cleaning windows in the truck ect. They buy these with their groceries and never account for them in their business expenses.

Air fresheners, Windex, Paper Towels, Pens, Paper, and the list can go on and on... Re-examine your purchases and see what you might be missing. All to often I find that people think that ONLY truck specific items count as business expenses when in fact ANYTHING you purchase for the use in, on, or for that BUSINESS, not just the truck is a business expense...

What I do is when I go shopping (I prepare and eat all my meals in my truck) I separate everything. If it's not food, or for my personal health, or consumption, and it will be going in my truck then it is paid for separately on it's own receipt and put into my P & L as a business expense because that's what it is.

PrePass, Internet load boards, up to 75% of your cell phone bill, parking fees, all sorts of things like these I find guys not accounting for, but yet they are all business expenses and should all be included in your expense calculations.

Now from what i read your looking good , and doing a great job, specially for someone just coming into this industry blindly. Keep up the good work and congratulations.

Mike