Starting with Roehl in 2 weeks. Have some questions...

I worked for roehl from November 2011 to January 2012. I wasn't northeast regional but doing van then switched to flats running all 48.

Your truck out of training will most likely be random. Some people get new trucks some get older ones. It's luck of the draw really. I got lucky with my first truck, a driver was quitting and he had one with a condo and apu. Age of the trucks could be anywhere from 2007-2015. I had a 2007 Columbia as my first truck then a 2012 prostar when I switched to flatbed.

Are you doing van, curtainside, flats, or reefer?


I can't speak on the miles as it's been some time since I've worked there but when I was in van I was taking home $300-400/week. After going to flats I was at $600-700/week.

I was treated very fair in my opinion, and I liked the company but I'll tell you to get a year in and move somewhere else that pays better. There's a lot of hand holding at roehl since they're a training company.

Good luck driver and keep us posted

 

I started out running flatbed, and switched to curtain side. I run between the lanes of Minnesota to Massachusetts. I started with a 2012 Prostar that had 273,000 miles on it. When I switched to curtainside, I got a 2013 Kenworth T680 with 107,000 miles on it. It's really a luck of the draw. My FM is awesome, and she hooked me up!

Let me put it to you like this, if you pick up your truck in Gary, it'll be older. Appleton/Neenah, or Marshfield, it'll be a new(er) truck. As for miles, it depends on freight, weather, YOU, and your FM. If you work your ### off, they'll give you miles. If you don't show you wanna work, you'll get crap miles.

Starting out, they start you on about 1800 - 2000 miles, and it can only go up, based on you. From what I hear, you should have miles but with the NE comes crazy weather, so you may be sitting a lot. Also with the NE, there's a lot of sitting in traffic. So, you have that working against you.

My money starting out was decent, but it took a little bit for it to start falling into sequence, as everything was screwed up between my training, first solo load, and hometime.

I have been treated very good here at Roehl. Over the past month, I've just started getting close to 3,500 miles a week, but I am also out for about a month at a time.

If you value safety, this is a good company for it. It's one of the better one's out there. Obviously there are pros and cons, but the pros outweigh the cons for me.

If you have any other questions, I will try to answer them the best I can. Shoot me a PM. I should get to it, as I am on hometime now!

Merry Christmas, and have a Happy New Year!

 

Wait you were only there 3 months? Or did you mean January 2013? You had like 5 different trucks.

 

Haha I was tired this morning when I got off work. Yes, I meant 2011 to 2013.

And yeah I didn't mention it but I had 7 trucks.

 

I was there for 4 months, 4 years ago. I went through 3 weeks of training and made like $400 a week for that. My truck was a 2006 Columbia freightliner, with around 350,000 miles on it. I was Midwest regional, supposed to be 5-7 days out, 2 days home. They kept sending me into Canada (mainly Toronto ) and out east.. I was never home in less than 7 days, once I was out 12 days. However, they never gave me less than 2.5 days off, and when I was out 12 days, they gave me 4 off. I did not struggle for miles at all. Usually they'd start me from Gary on a 1,000 mile run out east, then shoot me to Canada or Georgia and so on. I'd say I averaged 2,500+ miles a week including taking my off days into account.

I decided to switch to 7 on 7 off because I hated OTR. I was only doing it for the experience. I was 21 and lived at home, so I only needed to make enough to get by until I found a local job. My first 7 days out I got over 3,200 miles. They shot me out to Nebraska, then to Georgia, then Missouri, then back up. I came home and got a local job and that was it. I was making 28cpm doing Midwest regional which was a ripoff since they constantly sent me outside of the region, on 7/7 I made 30cpm. Was about to get bumped up to 33cpm the week after I left. After 1 year it was 36cpm. I made 11k in the 15 weeks I was on my own.

OTR has such a high turnover rate since it's not a pleasant job, but overall Roehl was ok to me and did get me miles.. If for whatever you hate OTR and can't stand it, switch to 7 on 7 off. You still get your experience but get guaranteed home time for half of the year. I know making 27-29k a year isn't appealing, but it's better than job hopping with little experience. When you have the time in, get a local job.. Pays better, your life will be better.

 

I recently(Saturday) quit Roehl. You need to know that I worked for them for almost 7 months and my average weekly miles was 1862. The pay scale is set up on a performance base system. If you don't hit mpg goal or mileage goal you don't get a raise.

The equipment you get is mostly junk. The first truck they gave me was an International the wouldn't climb a hill empty let alone fully loaded. The next one was a brand new Freightliner that the optimized idle never worked in and the bunk outlets quit working after just a few weeks.

This company is a nightmare. I fought with them about miles for 5 months and they would give me a week that would be good and then punish me when I came from home time with less than 1900 miles in 6 days. My paychecks went something like this: $550, $336, $420, $258, $459, $362, $278, $502. They deal with all the loads nobody else will take.

Oh and I was a National driver. This company is a regional run company with no miles. I sat on 800 mile runs for 3 days several times.

If you do go here I hope the best for you but 6 of the 8 drivers that started when I did quit with in 6 months because of the same reason I gave above.

 

####, I guess maybe I was there during the "good times". When I was there, for every one person That complained about getting less than 2000 miles a week, there were three that were satisfied with Miles they were getting.

My question is this, are they still stuck at 30cpm starting and Topping Out at 41cpm? Or did they finally bump that up? Over the last year, I have seen a lot of companies finally give in and start raising their pay. I think over the coming years, the trucking industry as a whole, but primarily on the over the road side, Will be getting out of this pay rut that the industry has been stuck in for fifteen years. Rookies should not be getting 50cpm considering how expensive they are to insure, plus the risk that you take with them. However, companies that pay 26-28cpm starting out are garbage.

 

They start at 32cpm now and that is to compensate for the low miles. It's not a complaint it's cold hard fact. I run at 125% productivity(per fleet manager). I hate sitting you know the saying "If the wheels aren't turning you aren't making money". Only one's at Roehl making money are the trainers and I'm not into training. No "National" driver should run 3 or 4 200 to 400 mile trips a week. They have people in place that only want to run that short stuff. Let them run it. Two weeks before Thanksgiving I had 1500 miles. I am aware of slow down at the holiday's but this was getting to be the norm when I came from Home Time. Only time I ever got over 2700 miles was when I saved a 650 mile run and sent it in the following week ended up with 3270. This company is perfect for Newbies but it is a 6 month company.

 

Sorry to hear that.. In the 4 months I was there, I never once waited for a load, sometimes I'd get a new load assignment a day before I had to deliver the one I had. My lowest amount of miles in a week was still over 2,000 miles.. I'd get quite a few of 1,000+ mile runs to deliver in tight windows.

Well, I guess I'll stop recommending Roehl to people.