So glad she arrived safely!
I have never personally used a professional shipper but have been around COTH for lots of years. Your experience sounds like what is typical.
I would guess that most people would prefer to handle their own horse once it has arrived.
Glad she got there safely!
I agree with the others about not coming up into drivewaysâespecially at night when they driver may not be able to see far enough ahead to know if they will have a place to safely and easily turn the rig around.
Theyâre almost always on a tight schedule with other peopleâs horses on board and they need to move on as quickly as possible. Iâm sure you wouldnât have been happy if theyâd been delayed 3 hours at the stop before yours trying to figure a way out of a dead-end driveway.
Should we assume a.m.? Or p.m.?
I wonder if thereâs a liability reason for handing it off especially if its on a road, a bit from the farm?
Walking it in from a trailer stopped directly outside the barn is very different from this longer walk in an area the handler is unfamiliar.
To me it makes sense that the owner/receiving party is who should take control at that point.
Ultimately its your horse OP and your responsibility.
How awful you had to walk less than a mile through private property to ensure your horse was settled in.
IDK maybe Iâm jaded since my place is inaccessible by shipping rig - they always drop off at the road if/when Iâve shipped, and most barns Iâve been at - the drivers arenât going to search high and low for where the quarantine stalls are or where Dobbin goes - especially in the middle of the night on a property they likely havenât been to previously. Horse is at address, owner or barn manager can take it from there.
Methinks the lady doth protest too much.
Mine got unloaded out on the main road as well, which is a scary, busy road normally but not so much at 3 am 
. Iâd never been in the barn after dark so had no idea where the light switches were, but we managed. Iâve never had a transport take the horse in to the barn/stall no matter what time of day they arrived.
@Rosem, how is your new horse doing today? Settling in well? I hope once you get over the frustration of the delivery that you will get to enjoy your horse.
OP, glad your mare got there safe.
Until I had the horse come from FL, my shipper experience was only going to local shows with my barn. Usually a 10 or 12 horse semi, shared with another local barn, taking us an hour or so to the showgrounds & picking up to go home 3 days later.
Horses were loaded at the ramp by the shippers, owners led them up. Same unloading, shipper took them off the trailer, handed the lead to whoever was waiting.
Even when this filled or emptied the trailer, they never took horses out of or into a barn.
Iâm thinking liability was involved.
The one time I contracted for a short haul for 3 horses, IIRC, the waiver mentioned minimal handling by shipper.
@outerbanks77 My vampire must have been in his coffin in the sleeper 
ââ A second nice young guy unloaded my horse, told me he traveled well for the 36h nonstop & handed me the lead.
@Kyrabee I helped my trainer unload 3 German 9mo stud colts arriving from quarantine in NYC to IN.
Only one came off like a jumping bean & fell sideways off the end of the ramp. Ramp had 3â walls either side, so this baby drew the short straw when brains were installed. Shipper said heâd been feisty going on too 
Late because your horse arrived. However, yeah itâs normal to have arrival times at all hours. The company I use gives me an hour notice and like you they say 10, but I clarify if itâs AM or PM. Also sometimes the truck canât get into the yard. I donât know who you have used but my go to company has always asked what my barn driveway is like and I know ahead of time what will happen. Unload at the end of the drive or pulling into the farm. Iâve had both.
Also I am always very clear how far away I live from my barn and request an hour out phone call. One time that never happened but barn handled it with horse arriving at 6 am and my phone call came from my barn!
All that being said OP, it sounds like you didnât ask enough questions which is fine because you donât know what you donât know. Iâd also not tolerate a BO who got mad over when a long haul horse arrives. That tells me they lack a load of experience since I the schooling show/trail rider has a clue on how this works.
Itâs okay to be frustrated but thatâs how this all goes.
When I shipped my elderly pony from Colorado to South Carolina, the semi could not get close to either barn. I had a great barn owner in Colorado who took care of him for me so I could get to South Carolina in time to unload him. She had to walk him out to the road, and said he loaded like a champ.
On the South Carolina end, it was a barn that was new to me and I was not sure how it would all go on that end. Pony arrived much sooner than expected, when the BO had a very busy day planned. She dropped everything and helped me get him settled. Again the semi could not get down the driveway to the barn, but luckily I made it there in time to lead him in myself. This was a pony who normally was lazy and would lag on the lead rope. Not that dayâhe was so interested in all the new sights and smells, he was quite hyper all the way down the long, long driveway.
Seems to me he was picked up in Colorado in the middle of the night. I was very lucky on the SC end as he arrived around 9 am, just in time to block school traffic on a very narrow two-lane road. No one seemed to mind.
I am so thankful for both barn owners.
Rebecca
I used to board and work at a barn with a creek cutting through the loooong driveway and a primitive wooden bridge with no sides for crossing.
The absolute worst was unloading a new horse on the road in the middle of the night, then picking your poison if you wanted to try to negotiate the bridge or try to wade through the creek.
It was a beautiful farm otherwise if it wasnât for that darn bridge.
I think I would take the creek everytime (just a personal preference since I donât love bridges myself).
I had a horse ship from San Diego to the SF Bay area. He was supposed to arrive at 4pm. I had tickets to a movie with a friend at 7pm. I did not make the movie. I think he arrived at 8pm. Just traffic delays and probably being too optimistic with the estimate.
The further they are shipping the more variable the delivery time and it could be nearly any time of day including the middle of the night. And also pretty much as soon as they come off the trailer you take over. So this all sounds pretty usual/typical for me.
In my experience, horses always arrive at night in a snowstorm! (maybe I shouldnât buy horses in the winter? 
)
I have always had shippers hand responsibility for the horse over at the bottom of the ramp. Literally. As in, Iâve confirmed that the horse coming out of the trailer is mine, once the horseâs feet are all off the ramp and the lead rope is in my hands, the shipper if out of the picture. In fact the last one unloaded (on the main road for the same reasons as everyone else), handed me the papers along with the lead rope of the wild eyed yearling, got the slip signed, and was heading down the road in under five minutes. Never even turned the engine off!
The legal grey of where responsibility lies during loading/unloading is interesting. It is like horses at auctions: just whose problem is it if they flip out during bidding and injure themselves. It all depends on whether the gavel had fallen. My understanding is: horse on the ramp/trailer it is the shipperâs. Horse on the ground, it is the ownerâs.
I came here to say this. 
You seem very put out by this whole (entirely commonplace) procedure. I hope you donât have to commercially ship too many more places⊠when/if something actually does go wrong!
So your new horse arrived safely- did that make you happy at least?
I have asked the OP twice about how things are going with their new horse. I wish they would update us. A new horse is so fun and exciting and all that stuffâŠ
Wait what? There are shippers who donât show up in the middle of the night? lol- I worked for a very large farm for years and I canât recall horses ever arriving during normal business hours. And Iâve been the driver too- doesnât matter how much you plan, you get a flat tire, hit traffic, a horse wonât load, etc
The new horse is fine beyond head and face bumps and scrapes that occurred during transport. Nothing that will scar (I hope.)
My expectations were based on the transporter who shipped out the previous horse two years ago from the same farm.
He kept in communication
He delivered at 3 pm and kept in touch frequently
âHeâ led the mare to the assigned quarantine stall.
(She did not have a scratch on her)
That is what I based an average long haul shipper to deliver.
If you are shipping from the Pacific northwest region pm me for the name of a superior shipper
Glad she is doing well!
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