| Hypothetical Situation
Food for thought.
A experienced driver looks for a new job, find out about one that sounds like the idea job for them, local daytime work, home every day, excellent pay and benefits it is a dedicated local account that is extremely time sensitive. The driver is thrilled and excited about this potential new job.
Makes a phone call to the recruiter on Monday, everything checks out, and the driver is scheduled to go to a three-day orientation the following week. That Friday the recruiter calls and tells potential driver that there a situation, that has arisen, and they will not be hired at that time, and if another slot opens up then they will be the first applicant called. The situation is the company has a husband, wife team that has been with the company for some time and the wife has health issues, and they both must come off the road. The husband asks the company to put him in the slot that the potential driver was supposed to fill so that he can work and take care of his wife. The potential driver thinks it is great that the company is willing to take care of their drivers, and says no problem and please call them back when there is an opening.
Two weeks pass and the recruiter calls the driver and says that there is an opening and are you still interested however, it is on the night shift? The driver says certainly, and arrangements are made for the driver to attend a two-day orientation, the third day was dropped due to a holiday. Orientation is uneventful although nothing about the company policies are covered and there isn’t a company policy hand book given to the new drivers. Driver asked about this and is told that your dispatcher will give you all that information. It’s a new account and all the details are not all worked out at that time, talk to your dispatcher. Dispatcher knows nothing and has no handbook or instructions at that time.
The driver attends orientation, passes all the tests, and is hired. Starts work the next week, told to attend a mandatory driver meeting the Sunday before the job starts. Finds out later that they are not paid for this. Driver is given company radio, which works poorly at best. Driver uses their personal phone for clients to call as the cannot call on the company radio as the driver’s company fails to give one to client. Driver is told that client company will do all the dispatching and that for all purposed they now work for this client and company.
The first day of work, the driver talks to the day driver to find out about the truck, and is told that the low gears do not work and there is a horrible shimmy in the front-end. Driver takes truck and sure enough the low gears do not work and it is all most impossible to keep the truck in the correct lane. Driver calls the dispatcher, and says that the truck is not safe to drive and needs a replacement. Dispatch sends driver to exchange trucks. Next truck is OK over all except the driver’s door will not shut properly. Later on, the truck develops more problems, which are documented each day for three weeks, but not repaired until the end of the third week. The fourth week the diver slips off top step on truck because there are no hand holds to exit the truck woth and reports this and the injuries to the company. Driver waits to let bruises heal to see if there is a need to go to the doctor.
Mean while the Driver experiences sexual harassment by the shipping clerk and mentions this to dispatcher and request that the company resolve this issue or move the driver to a different shift. It takes the company over two weeks to get this resolved, meanwhile a cop that is moon lighting as security at this plant (Chief of Police) makes sexually charged remarks to same driver, nothing is said at this point as a chain of event are about to unfurl that prevent anything being said to the company.
Driver comes to work as usual and finds out that one of the day shift drivers knocked over a power pole that powered the entire plant and it has been down almost the entire day and everyone is under major stressed because they are far behind. The driver does pre-trip and finds.that that seat will not air down and they cannot reach the pedals to drive. The trailer is loaded with extremely time sensitive load that will shut an entire plant down at the cost of $1000.00 per minute.
Driver contacts dispatcher explains problem offers solution, which is to cut or disconnect the airline to truck seat and crimp it off to avoid air leak, then at end of the shift have someone replace the controls for the seat. Dispatch says there is not a spare truck as it is in the shop so call shop and do what they say. Driver calls the shop, explains who they are, what account, etc. explain that they have tried everything they can think of at the time to fix the problem, and they have NO tools. They insult driver right off the bat with a sexist remarks, then they tell driver to get pliers to unscrew the quick connect on seat; driver says that they have no tools only a knife. and some zip ties. Ask shop if dealer or truck-stop can come out and do a temporary repair so that customer gets the load and company is not fined. The company shop is sarcastic and says you call them. Driver calls truck-stop shop, they will come but need repair P.O. from company before they will dispatch service truck. Driver calls shop and advises them what trucks top shop says, shop tries again to tell driver to get tools and disconnect the airline, and again driver explains they have NO tools. The previous week a truck was sent to the same truck-stop to get a flat fixed at this and was there over 8 hours that caused major problems with the client and they had made threats at that time about the account being terminated because of the continuous problems with the trucks.
Driver goes into plant to advise shipping clerk that there is a problem with the truck and they are waiting on shop to make arrangements. Driver does not talk to anyone else in the plant, and goes back outside to truck to wait on call from shop. A few minutes later, the company president, second in command, the heads of shipping for both shifts, the shipping clerk, and the plant maintenance man come out to see what the problem is. Driver does not say anything but they see the problem. The President and second in command start making threats about the fines that the company is going to be fined if the load isn’t delivered in time to keep other plant from shutting down. Driver says they cannot do anything; they have to wait on trucking company to decide and get it repaired. More remarks and threats are made they all walk off. Driver goes and finds the plant maintenance man, and ask him to look and see if he has any other ideas to solve the problem? Maintenance man says he will look and see. He looks at it and says same thing driver does, remove air source by cutting airline and crimping off. He reaches up cuts line and crimps off with a zip tie, he does this with out telling driver what he is doing. Driver does not say anything, and is happy to leave. Driver leaves so they can deliver the load that was taken straight off trailer and put on the line so plant does not shut down. On the way to plant driver calls dispatcher and says that THEY cut and crimped the line so that the plant maintenance man doesn’t get in trouble. Dispatcher freaks out tells driver they are in MAJOR trouble. Driver says that it will be put back to same condition when they get back to plant at NO cost to company. Dispatcher says call the shop and tell them, driver does, shop is very rude and sarcastic. The truck-stop never heard from shop or received repair P.O. Driver gets back to plant, finds maintenance man explains they are in BIG trouble with their company, and asked them to put the line back. Maintenance man puts line back as it was. At this time, the driver sees that the maintenance man didn’t actually cut the line but pulled it out of quick connect with pliers
The driver is fired over the telephone the next workday. Reasons that were given were: for disobeying company policy and ignoring instructions by shop and dispatch, and getting client involve with problem. The driver’s actions saved the company in excess of $150,000.00 in fines yet was fired.
Was the company correct in terminating the driver? Did the driver make a mistake? How would you handle this situation?  |
08.28.2007
Its useless to argue with ignorance
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