Teaming advice please

My biggest advice would be to have a plan that includes where you will go to work. Make sure the school you choose will be approved by the company you want to work at. Have this all planned out before school. Too many people go to school and then spend months looking for a job. Also spend hours on this forum reading about bad & good companies and drivers looking for jobs. Know what you are getting into.

Here is a post of mine from another thread:

"This is a common story. Spending money for training with no plan of action. No idea what you're getting into. Lied to by training recruiters. Lied to by trucking recruiters. No realist expectations.

Some research and an understanding of what lies ahead is not hard to get with today's technology. Most people don't seem to be willing to spend enough hours reading and researching to understand what they are getting into.

IMHO, you can learn so much more by spending hours on end reading through the information on this forum than asking questions. When you ask questions you get opinions with no way to gauge the person's reliability. If you spend time reading through threads you begin to see the patterns of the people posting and can gauge their credibility.

Reminds me of the saying "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail". Going to school for a CDL without knowledge of the industry or prospects of a job afterwards is not a plan. It is an idea. Some ideas are good and some are bad. In the process of making a plan you come up with something that has a potential of success or you move on to a new idea. Just my thoughts."

I'm not saying you haven't planned, I just see alot of people who invest time and money without a plan or an understanding of the industry.

Some companies might allow you to train your wife after they train you. I have heard some might send you out together with a trainer but I don't know if this is true. Many will send you out with separate trainers. With most of the mega-companies you can expect up to three months of training after school. Many, if not most will pay maybe $400 per week for a month or so and then up to $550 a week for the rest of the training.

Good luck with your career change and welcome to what I consider a great forum although I'm a newbie here myself.

 

What a huge/drastic change for the pair of you going from being home with your kids, working at factory positions to teaming together in a truck.

Training you as a pair may be difficult but not impossible. I like that you're paying for the training yourselves, you won't be slaves to anyone...congratulations for that!

Few people can run team anymore, the HOS just aren't condusive to running team. Hopefully that will change with the upcoming as 10 hours on and 10 hours off just doesn't work for teams.

 

You better be really sure you are ready for this. I'd rent a tiny rv and try a test schedule of 24/7 running if I were you. Teaming can quickly turn a good marriage bad. There is no escape when you are angry with each other. The loads HAVE to be there, you don't have time to get out and cool off. Can you make a good nest egg? Sure, if you stay out of truck stops and casinos. Pack right, find a company that allows you to have a fridge, and preferably inverter to keep healthy food and cheaper than truck stop food from the grocery store.

You are making it easier on yourselves by choosing a good school and paying for it yourself, but make #### sure to chose a good company or all you will end up with is health problems, a broken marriage, no money, and frustrated beyond your wildest dreams. Do not under any circumstances no matter what ANYONE says sign a lease purchase until you and your wife have many experienced miles under your belt. Trust me!

 

Amen to the above advice. You are going to get so mane companies trying to talk you into "being your own boss." Don't do it. What they have in mind for you is like McDonalds renting a super-expensive cash register to some pigeon, I mean Independent Retail Technician, and telling them they are their own boss.

No matter what work as someone's employee until you understand the job and become an owner-operator when you have enough experience and financial wisdom to be sure you can be more efficient than some trucking company with a few thousand trucks.

I don;t mind flying airplanes when I can't see past the windshield and I've jumped out of airplanes for fun. But accepting the financial responsibility of owning a truck scares me more than most anything. I was poor as a kid and I won't be poor again. I like others to assume the financial risk and let me drive. That is plenty of stress for me.

How are you two on very long car trips? Do you get irritated and angry and on each others nerves? If you team you will be cramped and you will get less sleep than you imagine. Some people just are never able to learn to sleep in a moving truck. In the 8 weeks I rode with a trainer the only decent sleep I ever got was when we were stopped or had a layover and had a motel. No matter how tired I got I'd only sleep for a few minutes at a time. There is almost nobody you can't wake up if you shake them. You will be continuously shaken while the truck is being driven. Some people adapt and others never adapt. I don't know how you could know about this until you are in the truck.

Only consider being a company driver not an owner-operator or lease-purchase driver, please.

 

When my husband and I ran team, we ran 10 on/off. Just curious as to how that doesn't work. Is it just didn't work for you? or??? just curious. We keep thinking about going back on the road but just not sure anymore. Don't want to go company and don't have the money to lease or buy so we would be stuck going company until we could buy.

Anyways, good luck and stay safe.