Well the lady at the gas station may not be able to drive it anywhere but certainly there are contingencies that could/have happened where she could be responsible for a given emergency (ie A pump hose breakaway doesn't work properly and the main shutoff must be used because gas is being pumped on the ground... and/or Fire). Heck, it could be a simple as a improperly mopped floor with tracked in diesel fuel which could cause a customer(s) to slip.

The lady in question is pretty much on her own... the boss shows up on the weekends and maybe once in the week unless there is a major problem.

With this said, she still has a great deal of responsibility(close to $4 million worth) and the keys to the joint. The point I'm making is she still gets treated like a human being and if it came down to her well-being or the store, my bet IS the boss would choose her every time(I know him pretty well).

Again, I've always got the feeling that many bigger trucking companies treat the human component(the driver) like a piece of equipment... with considerably less value then their trucks or trailers.

Incidentally, I've NEVER had a problem with my licensed son driving(free access) any of my vehicles and, God forbid, if anything did happen(accident/wreck) I would ONLY care about his or others involved well-being.... who cares about a freaken car.

I wasn't meaning the car or the truck, what if your son:

Got drunk or high and got behind the wheel.
Failed to stop at a stop light or sign.
Was riding too fast for conditions and caused a massive wreck.

Sure you care about your son. But you have accepted liability in this issue that can get you in legal and $ trouble when your son goes out in the car. You trust him right? You expect he will drive with some level of respect and responsibility and not go street racing, gunning the motor to obscene rpms, ignoring laws, or making dangerous choices. This is the trust I am talking about. You surely wouldn't hand your car keys to any friend that asked would you? You don't trust them that well eh?

As for the gas station owner, hook up with the right small company and you will find the same sort of thing in trucking. But there are gas conglomarations that could give 2 squirts about their clerks as they are a dime a dozen. The bigger a company gets the harder it is to hire large portions of people whom care about the people they work with. It doesn't matter if its a super market corporation, a trucking corp, or a sandwhich making corp. When the day to day affairs escape the owners ability to control he has to hire people, and usually eventually hire people to help the hired people.

Its not possible to screen every person for personality and intelligence... though at MY trucking company dispatchers will either have to have 1 year OTR expierence, or agree to get their CDL and be 'trained' by one of my drivers for a min of 90 days OTR. They WILL know what its like before they will be hired. I personally hate the idea of being bitched at about something from someone whom has NO IDEA what its like out here. "Why'd you go to the truck stop 15 miles away!? There was parking at the consignee."

Hey crackhead, the consignee has no food, drink, or restrooms for drivers and in 1 hour I will be out of hours. Kthx.

__________________


I am a Camaro Girl because IROC!

You have unlimited chances to go too slow, but only one to go too fast.

There is NO WAY that anyone can account for ALL possible contingencies in any given event. While I suspect your merely being facetious, there IS some degree of risk in any event in life. Heck, you could be sitting in your house and a plane could crash into it and kill you, just like what happened near Buffalo NY.

If my son or any friend of mine(I would have NO problem with the friends I keep, driving anything I own) did in fact, make a poor choice that resulted in a wreck, I would still deal with it from a human standpoint. Let's face it, people will make mistakes and there is NO possible way one could account every possible contingency. (ex. The CIA/NSA could detain my son, use mind altering drugs(LSD) to program him for a specific task, then let him go to perform the task... Extremely, extremely unlikely... but possible nevertheless).

You also point to a correlation between the size of the company and how they treat/trust employees. I disagree. There are plenty of large companies with greater employee bases than even the largest trucking companies that treat employees with dignity and respect.(Montana Dakota Utilities, IBM, Alliant Energy, Charter Cable, Pillsbury and Cargill to name a few).

What I'm saying is that ultimately it boils down to the people. The larger trucking companies(again not excluding Werner) management could choose to have better relationships with the drivers(ie treat the drivers like they would like to be treated). Unfortunately, the big players in the trucking industry choose a different path.

From a newbie, well really a (not started). Taking care of the truck (company or O/O) is a matter of PRIDE. I think that is one thing that has been lost in this country, some will even tell you that PRIDE is a bad thing. If I'm gonna work for a company, I'm going to have PRIDE in them. Keep my equipment in the best condition that I can, and keep myself clean and presentable. If I can't/don't have PRIDE in my company, well I'm at the wrong company.

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Tried it, didn't like it.

You've obviously never played culinary roulette at a gas station


How old are those corn dogs?

LOLOL that was priceless, OMG too funny

__________________
You have to do what you love to do, not get stuck in that comfort zone of a regular job.
Life is not a dress rehearsal. This is it...
Lucinda Basset

Wow! this thread went in a different direction

Ugh don't get me started on gas station delis god... I ate one of those chicken wings at the flying J deli and was sick for two days, lost a damn good team load too wont touch anything at the deli ever again yeck.

As for the job search not good, my plans to get a truck got put off when we got a letter of intent from the mortgage (sheesh 1.5 months late and they have a heart attack), so I used part of what I was going to put down on the truck to get that current.

So far, no one else has even called me back on my applications -_-

__________________


I am a Camaro Girl because IROC!

You have unlimited chances to go too slow, but only one to go too fast.

Re: the big companies... I do not believe IROC was referring to any company but transportation companies. The record is fairly accurate about how the larger transportation companies treat their employees. And it's not just the drivers.

__________________
You have to do what you love to do, not get stuck in that comfort zone of a regular job.
Life is not a dress rehearsal. This is it...
Lucinda Basset