Kruger Mill to SRY Rail Link Shops, New Westminster, BC

Continuation of the thread I started regarding building jobs around customers needs. In this part I will be talking about once a car is ordered how does the crew know where to actually spot it. 
Not every customer served everyday

One thing I have noticed about some model railroad operations is that jobs are expected to switch every customer every session. I was recently going back through some old information from my Trainmaster and AGM days on a few railroads. One of the things I was placed in charge of was creating job duty and customer switching plans. My decisions were based on a number of factors, so if you are interested in how some schedules are made keep reading. 

If a local pulls out of a yard, bound to serve a number of sidings heading out from its base and then returning, how is this handled? In my imagination the power leads the train normally, switches the sidings ... and then, absent any convenient way to turn the loco, the power runs around the train and pulls it, backing, to its home base? In the particular case I'm wondering about, the locals would work as much as 15-20 miles from home and return, rather than running the ~60-80 miles to the next division point.