The short runs in the most cases are the most tiring, in my opinion, because you spend a greater portion of your day at the docks waiting to get loaded or unloaded. When you pull up to the receiver at 7am, sit around until 10 am, then drive to the next shipper to pick up that load that delivers the next day at 6am 350 miles away, and you're stuck at the dock until 3pm, you are looking at a long day. Who wouldn't rather have a 1500 mile load that delivers 3 days from now? I know I would. Shorter hauls aren't the solution to fatigue. Not unless they do something to reduce dock times.

For me it is not a issue of time, but rather compensation, I really don't care how l9ong I am at a dock if I was being compensated the same as out on the road for being on that dock. When I drive OTR I am prepared to put in a 14 hour day regardless if I am driving or not. For me the fatigue factor comes in when I am rushed to get somewhere and then sit around while my trailer is used as a storage unit for free.

I look at OTR driving as a job where I try to get the most pay in the least amount of time. The fact that the industry does much to waste that time without compensation is what is fatiguing to me.

If I was King for a day my first decree would be to pay the mileage rate at the speed limit of the state you are in for every hour spent on the dock over 2 hours.

A friend of mine just took his first load with Crete today. He was laid off from a ltl carrier with me. He is used to running 3k a week at .535 per mile, 100% drop and hook with 3 day weekends. He just got an 800+ mile trip.(Texas somewhere) It's going to be a big life style change for him. He hates to lie on his logs. He wont fudge 15 minutes. He keeps asking me what have I heard aboout Crete on the net. I tell him mostly positive stuff but they have a terrible home time policy. He said he needs to make money. If I understand this right. Crete only pays .38 cents a mile and given the benefit of the doubt at 2200 miles a week is only $836.00 a week if you multiply that x 75% = $627 a week bring home. And they won't get you home!!! I know 627 is better than nuth'n but if your away from your family why would this be ok with everyone. I hear of alot of 20 year drivers there. I'am just curious what keeps folks there. I may need another job one day.

Crete did lower there pay about 8 or 9 months ago to new drivers coming onboard.. Im not sure what it is now (try there website), but it was .41 to .47 depending on your experience when I signed on a year a go for national drivers. Hopefully the economy will come back around and maybe, just maybe the can bring there pay scale back to the older one. Drive Safe

(CONWAY)

I hope you get miles. I have a buddy driving solo for them, no miles and LOW pay. He wont quit because they treat him well, money must not mean a thing to some people. DRIVE SAFE

Yep for some people all they care about is how good the company takes care of them or how nice they are to them. Personally I could give a flip because if they are running me like they should and paying me on time. I would have little contact with the company beyond sending Macros and coming in for routine maintenance and picking up permits..

$627 take home ain't gonna get me on the road for a month or more at a time anymore. I did 548 miles last week, worked 48 hours and did not hand print anything and did about $400 better then that. But if your young and or hungry I guess Crete may be as good as anyone to work for. Since many can't find work.

Excellent post. I understand where you're coming from in regard to customers using the carriers trailers for storage facilities. Just think of what they do to a carrier who has empties dropped at a business. They are there, as you well know, for preloading. Supposed to make it easy for the carrier as well as the customer. Those trailers become storage on wheels.

If the carrier complains he may loose this piece of business and that's not good right now. In the driver's case and I agree 110% with what you say. You are stuck waiting to get into a door or waiting forever after you get to to the door. This isn't right, not for you, not for your employer. If the carrier charges detention, he probably isn't going to get paid or may loose the customer, if he insists on what is rightfully his. Hopefully the carrier pays his driver whether he gets paid by the customer or not. You're right OTR drivers do a lot of things that they don't get paid for.

One thing that I've noticed is a lot of customers have become JIT because their customers arent ordering sooner. This makes it hard to stage freight and people are running around pulling merchandise, trying to get it together and out the door. But, a lot of reasons why you have to wait. Some is reasonable, most isn't. Again, the driver waits...

You're paid by the mile, etc and the LTL driver gets paid by the hour. It's really a shame that drivers can't charge accessorials like the carriers do or rather used to.

Stay safe and keep up your great posts.

__________________
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

Get 2200-2500 weekly , which is about 500 less than I'd like ,but I'm grossing a consistat $900.00 wk ,which from speaking to Crete drivers in my travels their miles were consistantly stated to be around 1800-2200 miles week I'm sure there are some getting more ,but not the handfull I spoke with ,But I'm at .37 cpm at Conway ,and I run the north east very often which pays me .05 cpm extra bringing me to .42 cpm most of the time ...I've hauled 3 hazmat loads out there in the north east which added .03 and bumed me up to .45 cpm on those runs ...crete only pays a couple more cpm than conway for an experienced driver with 1-3 yrs in ,So I doubt I'd make a note worthy difference in pay at Crete vs Conway ...

Gross income for 2008 $74,000. Don't think 09 will be as good with the miles down. But the market is down. I give you the layoff of your friend, My miles dropped in Nov. They have come back up alittle since then but not back to the 2800-3200 miles we are all used to. Top of Crete scale is 47cpm. My income is higher than the average of 56k-62k because of training, but even before I started training I was bringing home 68,000/yr and that was at 46cpm. He will find Crete to be at least as strict on logs as he is.

rail aint doing that good either..my daughters husband works for a rail co. Out of omaha that sinking fast. He was looking around for other workk and has been very unsuccessful and is actually quitting theindustry and going back to the family farm.. And w/rail # it being alot of coastal work..uhhhhhhhhhh how can i say this and be politically correct..well just look at the ethniticity of most drivers pulling rail

OMG I WAS HIRED AT CRETE AND CONWAY...WELL, CFI ON THE SAME DAY, CRETE OFFERED ME .04CPM MORE BUT THEN DID AN AUTOMATIC RAISE OF .03CPM FOR EVERYONE, SO I WAS MAKING .07CPM MORE THEN HAD I GONE TO CFI/CONWAY..THATS $175 A WEEK MORE FOR 2500MI..OR I COULD DRIVE 500MI LESS THEN A CONWAY DRIVER BUT MAKE THE SAME MONEY, LESS WORK SAME MONEY? HMMMM I LIKE THAT... we gotta lot of cfi/conway drivers coming to crete and i wish they were better...so they'd stopped coming to crete..lol