Swift Transportation Company, Inc. - Phoenix, Az.

Actually our system is very straightforward when a driver quits or is terminated. When voluntary, we just select the appropriate termination code. Most of the time the driver tells us why, so that makes it simple. The only voluntary termination code that can hurt a driver is if they quit and abandon a truck/trailer that we have to recover. The trucks have to be turned in at a terminal, I am pretty sure this is not unique to Swift, but I have seen a few drivers over the years say come get your truck. When I have to go get it, its an expense I dont want to spend, so we inform the driver they need to bring the truck into the terminal so they are not charged with abandonment. I even insure they have a ride home if needed. Now the involuntary terminations all depend on if its from safety or operations. Safety lets us know if a driver needs to be terminated. This is generally based off of falsifying logs, to many accidents etc.. The accidents will show up on their record, and the fact that we terminated will also. We strictly follow the ATA guidlines on accidents in regards to preventable or non preventable. Operations is soley based off the drivers performance. This is generally serious problems like acts of violence, harrassment, racial statements, etc.., but also includes poor job performance over a period of time (Always late to deliveries, consistently takes to much time off etc..). What most people dont realize is we get allot of drivers back to Swift within a year of them leaving. We want them back, they know our system and procedures, no additional training, no learning curve. There is no benefit for us to arbitrarily "blackball" drivers.

Wes

 

The pet deposit is correct, half of it is automatically non refundable. They generally don't take the whole amount unless the pet chews up everything and is not potty trained. Allot of apartments buildings do this also.

 

Vick, turnover is indeed expensive, which supports my claim even more. Company turnover problems would have been solved by now if said companies really wanted to solve those problems. How do they benefit? Let me tell you how:

Fact: stockholders control these bigger outfits, and the law says a company that is publically traded MUST maximize its returns to the stockholders. Empty trucks sitting around for days, even weeks, waiting on their next drivers don't maximize returns, and neither does 100% turnover, for that matter. Some companies, such as C.R. England, have over 200% turnover, yet their stockholders aren't uttering a peep.

Curiously, some companies (I suspect Swift is one) have vested interests in some of the trucking schools, meaning it could be in these companies' interests to see a certain number of their drivers quit each week so they can be replaced by those who come through these schools (I call 'em "driver mills"). Because of the prevelance of government grants training welfare losers, these mills are also expensive, meaning the interested companies get a nice little jack for each student who graduates. Then of course there are the companies that offer in-house training. Talk about a playing field that is tilted against the driver. His odds of coming out even are better in Vegas.

Now, Vick, let me make my leap here: I will claim that some companies (such as Swift) may have figured out they can mistreat their current drivers on purpose to get them to quit and be replaced by trucking school graduates. It's a rational leap. If a company has 15,000 drivers, sees 100% turnover, and each student pays upwards of 5 grand in tuition (either out of his own pocket or through a government hand-out), this can become quite a racket. And for those who are trained in-house, the formula works like this: sucker a newbie into your stable, give him (overpriced) training, hire him on, mistreat him, cause him to quit, and rip him for the tuition. A company training its drivers this way can't lose. Indeed, some companies may make more on their training of fresh meat than by running freight. Is it any surprise current drivers at these outfits get treated like dirt?

On a slightly different topic: I don't buy all the company whining about a driver shortage for a second. I can go down to a local Wal-Mart and and see this is a lie. If there were a true driver shortage I'd see bare shelves, not to mention shortages for anything else: food, tires, clothes, gasoline, whatever. Trucks deliver all these things, or at least that's the big argument I hear over and over again. But I checked just today and I saw plenty of goodies on the shelves, plus I was able to find all the gas I needed to fill my tank. Yeah, it's obvious the companies' claim that there is a driver shortage is nothing but a big ol' lie.

Could it be companies are claiming there is a driver shortage to get those government grants for the schools and maybe other preferential treatment (government welfare)? Again, I'm being my rational, thinking self. Of course, I say "yes".

I gotta tell you before you reply, Vick--I know I'm right. The big trucking companies (such as SwiftCo) are pulling one of the biggest fleece jobs in the economy, not to mention their trashing the careers of good people just to keep their training meat grinders grinding on. You'd better thank Budda, Allah, or God that I'm not in Congress, boy. I'd be sicking the dogs on the trucking industry tomorrow morning, and this turnover/training racket would be shut down by the end of the week.

 

Speaking of O/O do you still require your O/O to have there trucks governed to your speed standards. I checked into swift several years ago to lease my trucks on with but they wanted to govern the speed to like 65 or something do they still do that.

 

If you own your own truck and you bring it in, then no its not physically governed unless you request it. Lease purchase trucks are. That being said however, we do have a policy for owner operators to not go over 70 mph. With fuel climbing as high as it is, most OO tend to not run that fast and actually keep it down.

Wes

 

The government doesn't subsidize our drivers schools. We do not have gauranteed student loans. If a driver goes to our school, they learn the basics to get their cdl. Kind of like in high school when you had drivers ed. You were taught the basics. From there it would be up to the mentors to help get them more training. To continue on with the school, if you stay with Swift your tuition is reimbursed after a year. If you quit before that....how would we get our money? Collection agencies do not go around busting people up to force them to pay. So if they don't pay...we dont get paid. We can write off a small percentage of it, which doesnt equal what we spent while they were at school. Your outlook is we would make money off the 5k per student, my view is I can make 12K with the driver in a truck for just one month (before expenses). I make more with the driver in the truck.

We had a driver shortage last year, mostly due to the prepurchase of so many trucks so that we dont have to purchase the 07 diesel engines. The idle trucks sat, the investors were not happy. Take a look at Ed Wolf's comments about it.

If a truck is not moving, no one is making money. New drivers are the most expensive. They are more likely to have accidents, deliver late, top a trailer etc.. Why would we want to turn out experienced drivers that are the least likely to have these problems, just so we can get a new driver? Financially that makes no sense.

Tip, so you have two diesel mechanics to fix your rig. One just came out of Diesel Training Instute and he doesnt charge very much. The other has been around a little while but charges a little more. Which one are you going to trust your rig to so that it will continue to keep running and make you money?

 

Vick, again, my posts aren't aimed at you. If everyone at Swift were like you, that company may be pretty good. But we know that this isn't the case with SwiftCo. Not only is Swift not good, but it pretty much stinks as a company. I know how Swift is, as I worked for 'em for a few months back in the mid-90s. And after reading the endless posts here, I see old Swifty hasn't changed much. They're still treating their experienced guys like dirt, and I bet if we took a poll, we'd find probably 1 driver in 4 in the entire trucking industry has worked for Swift at some point during the past 20 years. That's quite a turnover machine.

You claim that companies such as Swift don't get any sort of subsidies for their newbie drivers, but I've heard from more than a few drivers and insiders that they do indeed get a jack for each new graduate they hire. I've read posts here that claim pretty much the same.

It really is too bad the big outfits like Swift can't treat their drivers better so they can get their turnover down to around ABF's level. But it's clear they don't want to do that. They want all their cleaned-out trucks sitting around parked or else those trucks wouldn't be sitting around after being cleaned out.

 

I am not taking anything as directed at me, and I truly do appreciate your questions and responses. The only tax credit we receive is when we hire a driver, and their background may give us a tax credit. This was most prevalent during Katrina. This is not tied to a trucking school, since anyone going to the school are not employee's of Swift.

1 in 4 drivers, you are probably correct, but we are a big company. The industry itself is a turnover machine, I am just happy we are doing better then the industry, and I am working on us to get to the ABF levels.

Thanks

Wes

 

Good luck on getting Swift's turnover down to the level it is at ABF.

I promised my old dispatcher on my last day at SwiftCo that I'd come back to work for him the day after doomsday. Maybe I'll see you there the day after the world explodes in a quintillion pieces of slag.

I've always, always wondered, since day one, in fact, why a company like Swift will abuse its drivers while it has a lot full of empty cleaned-outs sitting around. It must know it's gonna be just fine if those abused drivers do quit.
I've also wondered rather often (daily, in fact), what mechanism they are using that ensures they will, in fact, be "alright" when those drivers walk away.

I know companies that had half the turnover rate Swift has that went belly up pretty soon after launching. I guess the owners of those companies weren't in the know as to what the big secret is on how to have 150% turnover and stay in business.

 

Thanks. Will definately keep doing our best to reduce turnover. As far as trucks just sitting around, as a company this morning we were about 2.7% unassigned. This is trucks ready to be seated, trucks in the shop while the drivers in a loaner, or just plain in the shop. That is probably off slightly by a reduction of .1 to .2 percent, since the system doesnt filter out dedicated trucks that may have been unassigned for the night, or slip seat operations. Like I said, our turnover for operations (full drivers, not trainee's) is good (but we want great). One of the area's we have to do a better job is with trainee's, but we are looking at idea's on that now.

Wes