Consolidated Freightways Files for Bankruptcy

Yellow Transportation Joins ABA Freight Program

On Tuesday, September 3, Consolidated Freightways (CF), a longstanding participant in ABA's Freight Program, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. However, Joe Friedman, director of products and services for ABA, said that CF's decision to cease operations should have a limited impact on freight program participants. "There's only a small percentage of bookstores that used CF," he explained. "CF was normally used for shipments of over 250 pounds to one location." Yellow Transportation will now take CF's place in the freight program.

CF's bankruptcy filing came one day after it issued a press release stating that it was discontinuing operations and terminating 12,400 employees effective immediately. The company's CF AirFreight and Canadian Freightways, Ltd. subsidiaries will continue normally, the release stated. Vancouver, Washington-based CF was the third largest less-than-truckload (LTL) carrier in the nation.

Despite CF's recent financial troubles -- it had been losing money for seven consecutive quarters -- customers had no warning of its sudden decision to declare bankruptcy and freeze its operations, as reported by the New York Times. Three months ago, in fact, CF brought in a new CEO in an attempt to turn things around. Friedman told BTW that CF told PartnerShip, the company that administers ABA's freight program (as well as many others), that PartnerShip would receive 60 days notice if CF decided to shut down. "They never got it," he said. "This was as much a surprise to PartnerShip as to ABA."

Now, all in-transit CF shipments are being held up in CF warehouses, trucks, or transfer stations. And CF will not be able to release these shipments to other carriers until the bankruptcy courts give the okay, said Friedman. "That could be anywhere from two days to two weeks," he said.

PartnerShip will be contacting ABA members and affiliates participating in the freight program over the next couple of days. For more information, or if you are having trouble locating shipments, call PartnerShip at (800) 599-2902.

With CF discontinuing operations, PartnerShip signed on Yellow Transportation, Inc., the nation's largest LTL carrier, to replace CF. Furthermore, ABA members who are participating in the program will receive the same discounts from Yellow as they did from CF, Friedman said. Outbound prepaid and inbound collect shipments for U.S. and Canada and intrastate shipments will be discounted 62 percent. Minimum charge for shipments will be $65. Yellow's base rate is the same as CF's, so participants should not expect price increases, he said. --David Grogan