I didn't know that; but isn't Equity more of an OTR outfit?

Yes, but they USED to haul out-and-back. I used to get home sometimes twice a week and weekends, but that was more than 10 years ago.

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Equity is more of an OTR now, have to friends that drive for them and they dont get home mush and not much home time.

I didnt know Vans and Equity were owned by the same guy, definatly better equip at Equity.

I think thats what im going to do, I only hope they dont to do me what they did to my mentor when I was on his truck. we had to fight for good loads that werent 1500 miles and had to be delivered in 4 hr's. that just dont work :P at any rate, I got my own truck after being BS'd around the new boston terminal for 2.5 day's. and who ever ran it before me was descusting. penthouse mag's were hidding under the mattresses, shoot the mattresses looked like they been used for years, with no sheet. cigerette burns in the seats, dash all messed up. glass cover for the gauges was barely hanging on with electrical tape. none of the 12v converters worked, and swifts way of detailing is go through the truck with an broam and an fan to blow the dust off the dash. lol... had to be redtaged for several reasons, especually the 12v converters ;P cant live without an fridge, or something to charge my phone. during that they all gave me a loaner, an volvo 10spead... I been driving an 8 speed since starting school. takes me about 20 miles to get used to it where I am no longer losing my gears. this truck dont look much better then the one i was givin.

but, I will stay with them, pay my due's. maybe ill keep an eye on hmi and wait tell they hire drivers again.

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Keep them wheel's rolling, and keep on trucking.

If your really interested in working for a smaller company out of Michigan I know a couple that hire inexperienced drivers like me and yourself. I will be road testing for my CDL this Friday and have a pre-hire with a company out of Perry Michigan called Transfleet Web address is transfleet.com. Also NTB Trucking (ntbtrk.com) out of Byron Center, Michigan hires new drivers. Both are decent companies to work for from what I've heard from friends that haul for them.

I get the disrespect thing from some of my colleagues... I dont even need the Swift logo. I am different to them (being the only woman), and I think I might make them feel insecure? Most of my colleagues are wonderful, but just a few try to make my life miserable.
I would just develop a thick skin and soldier through it until your year is up. There are going to be idiots wherever you go...

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where # in MI..outside of kalamazoo MI in mattawan there is ralph moyle inc...70 or so trucks good co.

No fear... I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say, pay your dues for TWO YEARS at Swift. You'll be able to go anywhere you want after that. Short of a miracle, no company is gonna be any better than Swift if you only have 6 weeks under your belt... and I, for one, would not even think about hiring you if you quit after six weeks.

As for NTB, if you get along just fine on absolutely no sleep, go ahead and drive for them--they'll run the piss out of you. You'll be out three days making 650,297 drops at Meijer stores all over MI, OH and IN. Then you'll come home for 24 hours (or usually less) where you'll be in a coma until it's time to go back in and do it again. I drove for them back in '95-'97... maybe they've changed by now but I kinda doubt it... their SafeStat score was 94 last I checked.

One positive thing about them, at least back then... they had really good insurance including dental.

Edit: Ahh ####... just realized I responded to a crusty old thread. My bad.

wow, just got an email for this thread. I no longer drive an truck, although I kept my cdl, never know when I will need it again. At any rate, I lost faith in swift, after they decided it wouldnt be a good idea to pay me for my work, so I decided not to deliver there load untill they had an change of heart, eventually I got an fax saying there policy on paying employee's, to sum that up, it stated that payment for delivering an load to an customer is at the soul descression of the customer (if they threaten to cancel our account with them, we deliver for free, and will just take it out of the employee's check) that includes lay over pay, delivery pay, whatever. The inparticular customer for this case was Dollar General, and the load was there over 24hr's before the end of there aloted time frame.

when I got my check for that week it was under $50, and I was out of food, and water.


now that you heard me vent about that ####, I am doing alot better now as an 4wheeler, making around $250k/yr I host an number of websites, and am an partner in an large site that will be going live very soon, Dealzer(cant post links yet) although I did enjoy driving around the US, and seen alot of really pretty landscape's...(roads) I do alot better sleeping in my bed at night and not some bed that has been used by others.

GL all those who can do the trucking thing, I had a taste of it and have a whole new respect for drivers. stay safe and keep them big wheels moving.

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Keep them wheel's rolling, and keep on trucking.

I also drove for NTB for a little over 8 years starting in 1995 and I never had all the problems you did. Yes, you deliver to a lot of stores but except for a few reefer loads, they were all drop and hook. Also, quite a few of the backhauls were D&H.

They did change the way they did home time. Instead of getting home for 24 hours every third day, they went to 5 out and 2 home and the home time was a minimum of 48 hours.

Since it's a shorthaul operation, you do bump docks a lot. The last 9 months I was there, I had a bid run that got me home daily with weekends off. Each day I would bump a dock at least 4 times but it was no big deal.

I agree they did have very good and affordable insurance.

Shorthaul isn't for everyone but I liked it or wouldn't have stayed that long. I only left because I retired.