FedEx Freight

I joined the middle lane chain gang two years ago , we Fedex Freight drivers are LTL drivers , pulling mostly twins and triples with day cabs .

At Freight nothing is free but you do get paid for all you do , to hook a set , drop a set , meet a driver and fuel , detention is at minute one due to road hazard , inclement conditions, etc . Detention for waiting for a meet driver starts after my half hour break . This is paid at 36 dollars an hour , and dispatch trusts you to tell them when to start and stop detention. The thing about freight is they trust your word until you prove otherwise.

Pay is .79 cents a mile for singles and doubles , .84 cents a mile for triples , with task pay included ( fuel , hook , drop etc ) , pay averages .90 cents a mile . I am on a 610 mile round trip bid per night that pays 2650 dollars for 3050 miles a week , or .88 cents a mile .

The work week at Freight is Monday thru Friday or Sunday thru Thursday, weekends off , extra runs can be available on the weekends but it cannot be forced , as are layovers , which are optimal if offered . The work IS a grind , you will hook and break and stow 4-6 trailers a night , push gears , etc .

The mottos at freight are simple , I dig that . Don’t get hurt and don’t crash the truck is our safety motto . The work environment is positive, the bosses all have an open door policy and at freight we take care of each other , it really is a work fam . The work environment is patriotic and pro military , with walls honoring veteran drivers , the Taco Truck arrives sone Tuesdays and is at the yard all you can eat from 10 am to 10 pm . Sometimes a Hawaiian Luau is catered , sometimes steak dinners .

The highest paying bid out of my barn is a 656 mile round trip , five days a week with triples , this run pays 165k a year . All of the runs out of my barn are great , easy to get to , even the short runs pay well , for instance , 360 miles a round trip , a 7 hour day will earn you 85k a year .

So yea . I plan on retiring from Freight , as a driver or in another position. It’s not for everyone but as far as LTLS go , Freight is up there with Brown , OD, SAIA etc .

 

The insurance is Blue Cross , this rate is for a family plan , 401k is matched and is the Vanguard fund

 

North Salt Lake , the 401K performs really well , I didn’t know about a previous pension .

 

True ! lol . FedEx is very compartmented, departments don’t communicate well with each other and the buck is passed around quite a bit , that part can be frustrating. A good weird thing that happened to me when I was in the middle of a bid and ran out of hours ( my mistake in calculating my hours ) is I contacted central dispatch and they in turn contacted the load planner for a solution , I offered to reset for 34 hours on a Friday but the planner told me he wouldn’t have me set on the road away from home for my reset , told me to start my clock and then sent me a tow truck , and I was paid 36 dollars an hour , for the hook to take me and my set back to the house .

 

They combined all of Wyoming and Idaho into NSL and hired 50 drivers when I signed on and we still have drivers furloughing in , I was on the Rawlins bid I’m on now in the first two months I signed on . They have a s ton of freight , none of the senior guys want Wyoming in the winter for reasons . The AM and PM bids to Rawlins are thirty trailers a day , thirty to Wamsutter