First let me say, I don't hate truck drivers and I don't look down on truck drivers. I've met just as many good truckers, as I've met bad. I realize trucking is no easy buisness, and in any job, there are always stresses and flaws that can make the day less than great. But has anyone ever decided to look at the person working on the other side of the counter?

I have been working with truckers for about a year now. I have delt with everything from being screamed at in 12 different languages, marriage proposals (come on, who really is going to say yes to being proposed to in a truckstop by a stranger), full out fist fights in front of my register, ect.

And somehow, Flying J pays me 8 bucks to keep a smile on my face, and make sure all the food is fresh and full (in my dept.)

Imagine if you will, hearing all day:
"Give me MY bag"-which I have to think, asking,being polite, and giving me a chance to offer it would be nice.

"Why don't you have ______?" and
"What do you mean I only get 1 scoop" and
" Why is it so expensive?"-

--Ok, I wear the white name tag, Flying J gives me portions, recipes, and prices. The people working behind the counter have no way of lowering meal prices, changing recipes, or how much you get per serving. Why get angry at me when I am doing what I'm told? I don't ask you to steal or break rules with your job, why expect me to do that, so you can have an extra scoop of chicken?

And as for employees at Flying J being rude-lets imagine this scenario:

You come into work, ready to do your job, when you get informed that you are out of 3 major ingredients in every item on your menu, somebody has callled in, so on top of trying to figure out what you are going to cook, you have to do the absent employees job. On top of that, you have to cook somthing fast because the person who was there before you, left the place empty, with no food cooked or prepped, and if those pans aren't full, you could get fired for getting a bad secret shop report.

AND as you are going as fast as possible, you get some guy who can't speak English quite well, screaming at you because you are out of the product your supervisors didn't order.


Forgive us, if we are not sunshine and bubbles everyday.


The best way to get a positive experience at a truckstop, is simple, be polite, and respectful, and you will get it back. When fuel prices are up, and you want to kill the pizza girl for not having a pepperoni pizza out, just remember, those employees have it just as bad as you. They do the best they can to please you, without comprising their own job.

Peace

nice, i hope people read this and take heed to it. i try to be nice to everyone til they are not nice to me then i try to get more polite. rreally irratates them and i love it.

Since Flying J management states PLAINLY they are not a "truck stop". They consider their business a "travel plaza" that just happens to sell fuel for big trucks.

I just don't use them. Even though they are considered our #1 pick for fuel.

My money (and my companys) gets spent elsewhere.

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Team Players.....
It's hard for me to play professional team sports. On a minor league salary.

Is this ALL Flying J management or just a few you have encountered?

I treat EVERYONE with the utmost respect from the git go. Treat me with anything less and then we will have a problem.

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Just remember,if the world didn't suck, we'd all fall off.

Let me tell you about ONE of my experiences I had with "polite and respectful" Flying J employees.

I stopped about 6:30pm at a Flying J on a heavily travelled highway for fuel and food. I was met with rude and vulgar fuel clerks because I was parked in a "No Parking" area, regardless of the fact that there was NO OTHER parking anywhere, and I would be gone as soon as I ate my meal (the first meal of the day). When I decided to LEAVE (before I had a chance to eat), I was followed out to my truck by four employees who stated their reason was to get the "phone number of my company; call and get me fired", then they waited until I walked in between two trailers (mine and the guy parked next to me) before they (all four of them) attacked me, beating me and breaking my right arm in two places. They told the cops I was drunk/on drugs, which the cops told the THUGS was a lie, they told the cops I assaulted one of their THUGS, which the cops again said they were lying, they told the cops I assaulted SEVERAL of their employees first and told the cops I had a gun in my truck and threatened them.

But then again, you have PROBABLY already seen my website critical of Flying J, which by-the-way Flying J SUED me over and LOST.
Google Flying J and sucks.

I have NEVER been treated this way by any other employee of any other truckstop except Flying J.

NOTE: that is JUST ONE (of many) experiences with Flying J's "Polite and Respectful" employees.

You want to BMW about your thankless low-paying job? Don't expect any sympathy from me. Get an education and get a REAL job, hopefully one where you don't have to be "sunshine and bubbles" everyday.
My mother worked everyday in for the same truckstop in Colorado for over 14 years, she NEVER let her personality problems get in the way of treating ALL customers with respect, no matter how she perceived they treated her.

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I believe you work hard and do a good job.
But many more than not the workers seem lazy and arnt doing much except talk to the regulars drinking coffee.
I realize you only make 8 bucks an hour but many of you don't seem to be earning it.

Again you might be a good employee.

But it seems that the customers get in the way and are treated like it.

This job supports my daughter and myself while I put myself through school. Don't talk to me about education and having a REAL job. We all have to start somewhere, and honestly, how much of a college degree do you need to drive a truck. You cannot treat every Flying J employee by one that gave you attitude. Just remember, everyone is human, and everyone is entitled to a bad day. Its the ones that come in every week with the same attitude of either "I am a truck driver so worship me" or the foriegn idiots who believe women are here to grant their every wish on command. Just because you are a truck-driver, does not give you the right to no heed rules and regulations

I won't single out any specific chain of truck stops, but I will say that it is pretty common for the major national chains of truck stops to have the worst service, overall, of any independent restaurant or independent truck stop I have ever visited.

I understand why the employees at the major truck stop chains are far less professional than others at independent truck stops though, because I know how corporate America works. Customers at the smaller businesses are much more important to the owners, and those owners demand that customers are treated well. At the larger places, it is all about the "bottom line", and the treatment of customers has become worse and worse over the years.

I go to flying J's for all of my fueling, because I have to. I eat there, only when I am pressed for time and don't have time for an extra stop somewhere else. With the independents being pushed out of business more and more, I find myself eating in the truck more and more over the years. Not only because the service is average at best, or because the cost of the food is overpriced, but because the foot simply isn't good.

Sit close to the cook at the Flying J in Greenwood, LA, or Pearl, MS. Those are two stops I go to frequently. It takes about 2 minutes to realize that most everybody, including the cook, don't give a damn about their job, and we, the customer, suffers for it.

Also, working at a truck stop is a "real job". That is a pretty cheap comment to make toward anybody that is actually going out and working for a living.

Any time an employee views their customer as an interruption to things they want to do, they need to get a REAL JOB where interaction with the actual customer seldom happens, or to get a REAL JOB, one that he/she enjoys doing and not a job they "have to do" where they resent their customers.

So my statement wasn't a "cheap comment".

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That attitude is so typical of the general public and especially Flying J employees. "You are nothing but a <snicker> truck driver, what could you know about anything." As it happens, I have attended college, although I never Majored and never graduated. And I know PLENTY of College Grads that drive trucks. DOCTORS, LAWYERS, NURSES, COPS, CPAs and even Ex-Representative Ben (Nighthorse) Campbell (D-CO) is a truckdriver.
I dont do any business with Flying J any more, and havent for many years.
I don't treat anyone like that, not even my wife. In addition, I refuse to let any personality problems get in the way of treating EVERYONE with respect.
As I previously stated; my mother worked in the same truckstop in Colorado for 14 years, and never EVER treated her customers with disrespect, even when she worked the "bar" crowd between the hours of midnight and 5am.
It wasnt that I "didn't heed" Flying J regulations, I simply ASKED if it was alright to park where I parked, because

1. There was NO OTHER parking available
2. I had just purchased over 250 gallons of fuel
3. I was going to only be there long enough to eat dinner

The response from that Fuel Clerk?? She told me that if I didn't move my XXXXXXX truck right then, they were going to tow the XXXXXX XXXXXX!
(You guess the actual words)

I immediately left......or tried to.

Then there was Stamathis, who was falsly accused of "stealing" fuel and after he had been arrested, the Flying J mamager called his company, accusing the driver of stealing fuel, of being drunk/on drugs and told the employer the driver was taken to get a "drug" test. (He won $705k jury award)

Then there was Reese, who was MACED by a Flying J manager for declining to buy an OVER-PRICED hat. (He won a $82k jury award)

I have NEVER heard of the employees of TA, Petro, Pilot or any other major truck stop chain behaving in such a manner.

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