Originally Posted by snowbegone

They only care about their money and the only way you will get taken care of there is if you live close to Superior, WI and bend over for them.

I stand by every comment I made before about this crumbling, sorry excuse for a company, with some more editions.

Hometime? Unless you are on your dispatchers "good buddy" list, they seem to think you have to go home with a load hanging over your head. This is even more the case if you don't live near the terminal. I used to live right near the I-94 corridor in Black RIver Falls, WI. The only loads they ever wanted to give me to take home would barely give me 34 hours off, and they alaways, ALWAYS went to NJ, NY or some undesireable hellhole that west coast crybabies were too good for. This was true even after I had been on the road over three weeks.

I started getting smart and simply eating the gas and bought a 2nd car to drive up there, just so I could give them the finger when they lied about not having any freight.

What especially got on my nerves is my dispatcher would tell me right to my face that i could have 3 or 4 days off (after working my ### of for 3 weeks, laying over twice, getting screwed out of my layover pay, etc). And wouldn't you know it, not even a day at home, and someone who is not even my driver manager ends up calling me on the phone telling me about all these hot east coast loads that need to get there yesterday. But oh, the west coast crybabies can take all the time off they want. They're the Vinje family's special adopted children, after all.

Fuel and Routing? This is the only outfit I've ever heard of trying to run drivers out of route, not paying them the extra miles, just to get their hands on cheap fuel. They use the same idiotic fuel program that all the big companies use. For example, I took a load one time from Pueblo, CO to Joliet, IL. My first authorized fuel stop was on the far north side of Denver, a total of about 40 or more miles out of paid route. Their genious "fuel and routing" cronie couldn't understand why I demanded a new fuel stop. I simply explained that if he wanted me to fuel there he would have to get dispatch to pay me the extra miles. And this guy used to drive for them?!? For those of you who work for Swift, Werner, or other similar dirtbag outfits, you will notice that usually 80% of your fuel stops are crime infested ratholes with barely enough room to park a pickup truck. I finally got sick of their garbage and expained that their penny pinching is not worth my misery. My fuel stop compliance dropped to near 0% my last few months working there.

New trucks? Coffins! I'm seeing a lot of new flat top KW's going down the road. Who would seriously want to do long haul in a company truck like this? The Aerocabs they've had for years are bad enough. Same gutless, detuned C13 Cat with too high of an axle ratio to climb hills. Worthless 10 speed. At least give your drivers some room to breathe when they get stranded for days at a time with no load. Now that Monson and Timberline are gone, 80% of the competition is eliminated. They seem to think this gives them the right to treat drivers even more like dirt.

Don't just walk from these guys, RUN!!!

Originally Posted by diesel_weasel

Well I spoke with a Halvor driver yesterday. The reasons for the new flat tops with super singles are this. When Mosnon was wiped out of the picture, a good deal of regional freight opened up out of NuPage and Sappi. Fil-Mor and a few others tried to step in and steal some of Halvors existing freight as well as all of Monson's. So the main reason behind the smaller trucks was to keep from losing probably 3 or more major accounts as well as picking up a lot of regional feight. A small somewhat cramped sleeper is better than being jobless.

I guess they are actually busy again according to the guy I talked to. Their long distance OTR is a little shaky but regional is going nuts. Makes me wish i would have stuck around there, But I was starving from last November through February.

You said it yourself, there are far worse places to work. Why not give them the benefit of the doubt and move on if you're so happy with your new job? If you're happy, that is...