When the driver has to wait on the customer, Part 2

Given this [prison] location, the type of truck assigned to the route, and surrounding area, I can tell this UPS driver who services the prison probably has a 13-15 stop per hour route. The one stop here that costs him 10 or more minutes was equivalent to 3-4 other stops in the same time — time that cannot be made up without racecar driver efficiency and the hope that other stops will be ultra-thin on time, allowing him to catch up.

Many times, however, you don't recover time lost on such stops. You hope that your remaining customers are nice enough to stick around a few minutes past their closing time to accommodate you. I can't count the number of times I had to alter my route to make it to businesses who would not wait a few minutes past 5p if I was running late.

The example in the previous post increases driver stress, and this same thing happens to every driver no less than three or four times each week. Now you know why you can hear that UPS truck coming from three blocks away; because the driver is flooring it to make up for lost time along the route.