Metal Roof Shipping Information

Seamless Delivery Coast to Coast!

We’ve been at this a long time and if you’ll take a minute to read this section, things will go a lot smoother and you’ll know what to expect.

There’s two distinct methods we use to ship your roofing materials to you. What determines how your materials are shipped is based upon whether you’ve ordered Vertical Panel or Shingle Style metal roofing.

Vertical Panel Roofing Style

We will make sure the panel truck driver has clear instructions to your job site and your telephone number so he can call you 24 hours before arriving. It is important that you meet him there when he arrives. Vertical panels and the accompanying trim will arrive to you via the panel manufacturer’s truck. Note that this is full-sized semi rig. It is 72 feet long from bumper to bumper.

As such there are a few restrictions that apply. They are:

• Roads: No dirt roads (short driveways being acceptable).
• Maneuvering Room: There must be adequate room for such a rig to get in and out as well as deliver to where it is best suited to unload. This could mean that where it is best suited to unload may not be where you had in mind. Obviously such a rig can not make it in (or even unload) alleys and other tight spots.
• Lifting Device: You must have a lifting device on site for unloading the truck. Bundles of panels are heavy items sometimes weighing more than 800 lbs each and your panels may not be on the top of the stack. The driver will not help you physically unload your materials and can not wait for you to do so even if you have extra help to assist you in “hand unloading” when he arrives. Besides, attempting this will certainly result in scratched panels. A suitable lifting device is a forklift or maybe a tractor with a front loader bucket.
  A forklift with the ability to extend/reach out (5000 lb lift capacity) is well worth the money---you can load your materials up on the roof with it! If using a tractor with a front loader bucket, hook wide nylon ratchet straps to one side of the bucket, run them under the bundle of panels placing a 1x4 or some other type of board between the strap and the bundle so that when the ratchet strap tightens it will bend or distort the panels. Then hook them to the other side of the front bucket.

  Make sure your tractor has sufficient weight not to tip forward when it lifts the bundle!

Shingle Style

Shingle Style metal roofing can be picked up at one of the eighteen distribution warehouses if you live in their area.

If you do not live close to one of the warehouse locations or if you want job site delivery, your shingle style roofing comes to you via one of two contract LTL (“less than full load”) freight carriers that we have used for years: Fed Ex Freight or Saia Freight.

When taking delivery via one for these freight companies, there is an $85 jobsite delivery charge added to your charges.

Be sure of the following:

• Adequate Maneuvering Room: You will only be inconvenienced, as will we, if there’s no room for such a truck to access your property.
• Steep Driveways & Dirt Roads: Just because you can drive a regular passenger vehicle up your driveway, does not mean a freight carrier can make it. Excessive dirt roads to access your property will cause the freight carrier to contract the load out to someone who will travel dirt roads. This causes your load to be unloaded again, risking damages, and we know for a fact that such carriers are not the gentlest sorts of people.

Please. Not being realistic in requesting jobsite delivery will result in extra charges and/or you having to go to the freight terminal and picking the merchandise up from there.

Job site delivery is usually accomplished with truck and “pup trailer”. A pup is 28 feet long and will be equipped with a lift gate so they can be gotten out of truck without your help. The key word there in describing the length is usually — sometimes the trailer is longer so keep this in mind when considering the above criteria for jobsite delivery.

Each cardboard box of Shingle Style metal roofing weighs about 70 lbs and there will be a number of them secured onto individual pallets. The truck may or may not be able to unload right where you want them so having a forklift is a darn good idea.

With a forklift, you can also get them up on the roof without breaking your back!

Damaged/Missing Merchandise

On rare occasions it sometimes happens that merchandise is damaged or missing in the shipping process. Since Vertical Panels are shipped differently than Shingle Styles, let’s take a look at both possibilities and what to do:

Vertical Panels: As noted above, Vertical Panels are handled by the panel manufacturer from start to finish and therefore, their truckers are intimately familiar with what precautions are needed to ensure a smooth delivery.

Vertical panels come bundled together with a label that tells you what is contained in the bundle. On each bundle there’s a scrap panel over the top to protect the ones underneath from scratches and such.
After you’ve got the load off the trailer, you will be asked to sign a packing slip that contains a list of everything that’s supposed to be on the load. Assuming everything is there; sign the packing list that you have received all merchandise. If there are any damages, or missing parts, note that on the Shipping Receipt and affix your signature near that notation.

Please fax back the Packing List that has your signature and the notation of the damages to us at earliest possible convenience. We will then make immediate arrangements to get the parts to you. E-mail pictures, if possible, are great too!

Shingle Style: When receiving your shingle style roofing materials from our freight carrier be sure to note any damages that might be present on the Packing List. We ask that you then fax a copy of that Shipping Receipt to us at your earliest convenience. If possible, e-mail pictures are great.

You are the customer and come first so we will ship any required merchandise to you at the earliest possible time. But please help us out by adhering to the above so we get a chance to make our claim to the freight carrier.

Thank You!