That's good advice even if you just pull a pallet jack.

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Z-Lady's devoted hubby.

Schneider uses Definity Health. You can purchase additional disability coverage above what you get standard from Aflac. (according to the files they sent me)

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Al

Here is some scoop from a Prime driver (flatbed) who has just finished a lease and is doing it AGAIN! Last year I ran 161,000 miles, solo, put in the bank $72,000 and was home about 50 days. You have to run to make money; if you are willing to do that, you can. Here is my theory: if I have to be out here then so be it; I want to make the most money I can and Prime does that for me.

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wow thats a wonder average 72,000 in the back doing 161000 miles you know that comes out to a little over 2 bucks a mile 2.26$ actaully
seems your a magician because prime only pays .88 a mile but man your doing good you pulled an extre 1.40 a mile out of them KEEP RUNNING LIKE THAT

You might want to re-check your math.

So you ran at minimium, 500 miles a day, for 315 days? That's awesome. How did you do it? I had two 34 hour restarts in two weeks while the DM played "find the load" with my last trainer.

My dispatcher has worked the boards for 15 years and has a reputation. U had better want to run... once he knows he can count on you, away u go. Like I said earlier; Prime will let u log the speed limit, even 65 on Ohio toll roads, that is the only way I can keep from bumping into my 70 hrs (that and logging 15 min for every load and unload). I have more torn out pages in my log book than not, and DOT gives me some sideways looks, but my log is always legal....sort of. I hardly ever refuse a load, maybe once or twice a year, just get it, go, and get something else. Sitting never pays.

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You are playing a dangerous game...
IMO, one that is akin to Russian Roulette.

God forbid that you ever have a serious accident, (regardless of who is at fault) because all of your shucking and jiving WILL be discovered, and you will be in jeopardy of losing everything that you have worked so hard for. There may even be a stay in prison in the cards...

Why not work for a company that pays well enough so that you don't have to take such risks??

I see the Prime trucks with families of 4 in them all the time. Very sad...

In my opinion, it is foolish to work for an outfit that makes you risk so much to get so little.


Good Luck

I am glad to see you are having a good time killing yourself, and maybe someone else in the process, while making the company rich.

If you don't die from DVT because of sitting for 10-15 hours straight, you may fall asleep and kill yourself and/or someone else.

You ever notice those skinny, old looking, really wrinkled drivers? They look 65-75 at least don't they. They are probably around 55-60. I wonder what made them look that way?

An ltl company I used to drive shuttle for would send me to one terminal where I had to sit for several hours almost every night I went there. I always logged on duty, not driving.

An old (and I mean really old looking) driver was bragging about all the miles he would get in a week, and how many hours he would work Friday night and Saturday. He was logging off duty anytime he had to wait for a loaded trailer in order to get more miles. He start chewing on me when he found out I logged line 4. (this was before the 14 hour rule)

I asked him why he wanted to work 80 to 85 hours a week to run the miles he should have gotten in under 70. He claimed if we did not log off duty, then the drivers would be out of hours on Friday night, and the freight would not get to the next terminal.

My response was that if that happened, then maybe someone would get on the dock hands to get the trailers loaded so we wouldn't have to sit.

I am not going to give away my time without a good reason. I am also not going to ruin my health any more for someone else's freight. I am in bad enough health now, a lot of which can be traced right back to my younger days in trucking. I used to run at least 2950 miles from Sunday evening to Friday morning. This was 2 seperate trips and multiple stops of furniture. It was not unusual to run 3 trips and do 4400 miles by Sat. morning, and start all over again on Sunday.

I made good money, got paid by the stop, was paid hub miles for every mile the truck ran, even if the mechanic was test driving it between runs.

I don't have that money now, but I do have a bad back and numerous other health problems. I am lucky, many of my friends have had open heart surgery, or are dead.

A driver I ran team with years ago recently died an early death. He took pills to make the miles. I knew a driver who came in from a Ca. run, got out of the truck to roll down the landing gear, had a heart attack, and died. A blood clot in his leg traveled to his heart. (DVT)

Oh yeah, the very old looking driver I talked about earlier was only 57. He looked 70. Another driver for that company who worked out of the same terminal as I did died of a heart attack while in the shower getting ready for work.

Is working all those hours for very little money worth ruining your life?

I could post many more examples of drivers I know, or knew, but I won't. I guess you know what I would say about what happened to them.

BRAVO!!!

A great post

Thanks!