Dead-head

Dead-head miles are the ones nobody pays for: a one-way airport drop that sends the car 40 miles home empty, or a chauffeur driving two hours to start a charter in the next city. On a one-way transfer, the empty return can equal the paid distance, so the real cost of the trip is close to double the odometer the passenger saw.

The trade has always priced around it. One-way rates carry a premium over half of a round trip for exactly this reason. Many operators add a dead-head charge when the empty leg exceeds a threshold, often 30 to 50 miles, or price long out-of-town pickups as if the car had started from the pickup. Others farm the trip out to an affiliate based closer to the pickup and avoid the empty miles entirely.

The common mistake is a dispatcher accepting a far-flung one-way at the standard point-to-point rate because the day looked slow, then paying a chauffeur three hours for one hour of revenue. A second mistake is failing to pair a dead-head with a return run that was sitting unassigned.

How liverybook handles it

Dead-head is a pricing convention rather than a status. On the run board the upcoming rail lists unassigned trips, so a dispatcher can spot a return run near a one-way drop and keep the car loaded. When the empty miles cannot be avoided, the charge goes on the leg as an extra, or the trip is farmed out to an affiliate nearer the pickup.

Related terms

• Garage time
• Farm-out
• Point-to-point
• Multi-leg trip