To backload is to secure and load cargo onto a commercial vehicle that has just finished its primary delivery. Carriers do this to generate revenue on the return trip to their home base or next major hub. It prevents the vehicle from running empty, which wastes fuel and driver hours.
Heard on the job
Once you drop those pallets at the distribution center, dispatch wants you to backload a shipment of paper rolls heading back to Ohio.
Also heard as
- Backloading
- backhauling