My SO is from New Zealand, in this country legally with a green card for about 1 1/2 years. He has driven trucks in England, New Zealand and Australia - as well as the United States. His total years of experience driving trucks is about 10 years (he is 44). He has operated swing lifters in Australia and driven (food grade) tankers in the USA. He has driven in the US less than a year, and never has had an accident anywhere in the world. So, why, when he calls companies here in the United States, do they only accept experience driving in the United States? (Also, he has a job currently with a tanker outfit but wants to change to something local or regional. He had to return to New Zealand due to some family matters and the company put him on leave when he told them he had to resign to go back home for a few months, because they wanted him back.) He has phone numbers for all the places he has worked in the past and has offered these to the companies he has contacted, but they won't call internationally to verify his experience. I don't understand this attitude in a country that is begging for drivers. My SO is frustrated and also pretty irritated by the fact that he can only make as much here in a week as he makes working a weekend in Australia. Any suggestions on how he might get a local/regional job in the United States? (And, the plan is for us to go to New Zealand and then to Australia after I get my CDL.)

You and your husband have bought into the BIG lie.

There is no shortage of drivers in the US, only a shortage of CHEAP drivers.

The less experience they accept from your husband, the less they have to pay him when he starts.

Sorry, that's a fact of life handed to me, when I returned to trucking after a break. Companies refused to validate/accept ANY of my prior experience. Although I could provide several GLOWING references.

It's all about how much money they can save the company...not safety, not the driver, and not the drivers experience.

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I'm gonna kill the next SOB who tells me I look stressed out.

--Unknown

Man, I know life is tough but Hell, keep your chin up there danc694u. There has to be some good in your life.

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The trouble with the world is not that people know too little, but that they know so many things that ain't so
- Mark Twain

Let's support our new president,
but Obama should remember one thing,
Gray Davis.....

I am in Canada as an immigrant, and only my Canadian driving history counts here (both truck and car).

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I am not sure but I would say because coutries usually have different regulations being a little more lieniant (SP?).
I will try and find out when I go back to work , you must remind me on Sunday night

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"Sometimes I wonder if men and women really suit each other. Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then."

A motor carrier has the right to accept which driving experience they wish to accept. It is usually based on the criteria of their insurance carrier.

From a retired federal DOT officer

As we are in New Zealand and he has been working for the country's largest dairy company and making very, very good money. And he is driving tankers - hauling milk from the dairy farms to the processing plants. He carries 23,000 liters, makes between 2 and five stops to get that much and up to five trips per shift with a full load. (It's a tanker and trailer on a draw bar.) Driving on gravel roads, sometimes only one lane wide, and then some of the tanker tracks around the cowsheds can be so rutted, he has been afraid the trailer was going to tip over! (They report this to the dairy company and if the cockey doesn't fix it, they won't pick up the milk.) Definately a different game over here, that's for sure. Sadly, they need experienced drivers here, just don't have the pool of good drivers since there is more money to be made in Oz. But I'll tell you, driving these roads and the rolling hills are covered in green, so smooth it looks like carpet, dotted with cows and sheep - can't beat it! This has to be the most beautiful country on this earth!

I understand the terrain down there quite well. I have been to your country, both North & South islands, as well as the other one just next to you many times, the first of which was around 1967 or 68 when I was flying off a U.S. Naval aircraft carrier(s)......the U.S.S. Ranger & then the U.S.S. Bonne Homme Richard (I flew the A-4 Skyhawk, then transitioned into the A-7 Corsair II in the early 70's). I also had a young lady that was my pen pal from the time I was probably 9, or 10 years of age who lived just outside Sydney. My wife & I both flew Quantas for her wedding in the late 70's.

Starting to get warm for you all finally. I'll bet that makes many people happy.

Then you remember the roads, for sure! Ever get on State Highway 25 to Whangerei? He took me over that - up into the mountains and back down on the way to the east coast of the north island. What a curving, twisting two lane highway that is! There were some places I swear I could read the back license plate on the car! I can't imagine driving a tanker with a trailer on a drawbar on that, carrying 23,000 liters of milk, but we saw several dairy tankers going back and forth. He has driven that more than a few times, himself. Have to go where the farms are! I remember my instructors telling stories about driving in the mountains in Tennessee, but that would be a piece of cake compared to SH 25 in New Zealand. I forgot my camera that day or I would have taken some pictures to send back to them. Although, I was driving the car, and I could not take my eyes off the road for a second.

We may get across the ditch to OZ in a few months, or at least my mate will, when his contract ends with the dairy company. Due to end Jan 31st, but they may extend it until the end of March. Depends on if the weather is good, the grass keeps growing and the cows keep producing. Milk production will naturally drop off as the weather gets hotter and the cows are in calf. The money is much better, work is easier over there. I may have to stay here and work, since I have a temporary work permit in NZ, and can't immigrate easily to Oz. We've been apart for months at a time before, so it wouldn't be anything new. Not the best situation, but at least we might get to see each other across the ditch rather than on the other side of the world! I'd like to see Australia, myself.

Lord, that was over 35 years ago. I don't remember road numbers from that far back.

And I grew up on a 2,600 acre farm in Illinois that was 96% (+/-) tillable.