New Drivers: Research prospective employers

With the tools available to everyone on the Internet it is super easy to get a feel of how a company is ran before you even get to the point of applying for a driving position. Everything is at your fingertips.

For the purpose of this thread I will use my old truck and the company I was leased to at the time.

First, get the DOT number off the side of one of their trucks, or google “(company name) DOT number”. The DOT number alone can tell you a lot. The smaller the number the longer they’ve been around. An older company with a high DOT number can mean a few things, legit business changes can be a reason for change but oftentimes it’s for nefarious reasons such as destroying the safety rating on their previous number.

In regards to the trucks themselves, if you go looking for their info and the truck doesn’t have permanent lettering or if it has tape marks on the paint from covering the lettering up with info from a different company that should be a huge red flag.



Once you’ve gotten their DOT number you will want to go to this website and type it in.
SAFER Web - Company Snapshot
Verify the info matches what you know to be true. Does the DOT number match up with the carrier name their advertising for? Does the location and phone number match?



Then you will want scroll down a little bit. You will see their inspection history. It will show how many and what type of inspections, the carrier’s out of service rate, and the National out of service rate. If you know they have quite a few trucks but they have few or no inspections then that will tell you’ve they’ve just started using the authority they’re running on and that is a red flag.


Once you’ve looked at their out of service rate you will want to scroll back up and in the top right corner you will see a link that says SMS results. You will want to click that.


It will open a new page. You’ll see the same out of service percentages as the previous page but now you’ll want to scroll down toward the bottom and click Complete SMS Profile.



Once you click that link you will be able to see their violation history. A lot of equipment violations means they run junk and don’t repair mechanical problems. Probably a good idea to stay away. A lot of hours of service violations means they probably expect their drivers to bend the rules and I’d probably stay away. A lot of speeding or following too close could just be dumb drivers but could also mean they run things scheduled super tight.

If you’re a new driver one thing you need to realize is that a bad company can ruin you in this industry. Protect your license and protect your PSP to the best of your ability so that you don’t end up having bad carriers as your only employment choice.

I’m sure I’ve left things off as I was typing off the top of my head. Hopefully other members will chime in and add to this.