Gordon Trucking

Too bad Gordon sounds like a good company. Did you check out Interstate Dist. they have a yard in West Sac, and they have a good rep.
Are you going to one of the schools in the Sac, area ? If so which one and how do you like them ? Well good luck with this.

 

I know what you mean, truckin. I live outside Grants Pass. I was just refused yesterday for a $2000 Job Counsel grant that I was trying to get to help me pay for school because of work history. Never in a million years did I think I would get rejected.

Never mind that I owned and operated a cleaning business in the bay area for 15 years. Or worked at the Oakland Coliseum for 6. Or finished a network systems engineering degree in spite of the fact that I hated it. Since finishing school in 04 I have had 4 jobs. One was temp and ended, the other was financially unstable, our payroll checks were bouncing, the third was due to a personality conflict with a co-worker and the fourth I quit to move here to the Rogue Valley. The Job Counsel is supposed to help people who are having a hard time. I had to fill out an application giving my work history, then go thru two weeks of stupid classes before I could be assigned a counselor only to then be told that I could not be helped because I have a poor work history. Why didn't they tell me that when I turned in the mandatory job history app in the first place. Well that's how they get funded I suppose then only help people who look perfect.

I can only imagine what some of these truck companies would say to me. In fact I called an Interstate Recruiter anonymously to feel him out about my situation and he told me that he just wouldn't be able to use me. That I should go get a job at Swift for 6 months to show a work history then come and apply. Jesus.
I cannot afford to pay for my own schooling and the workforce grant is only worth $500 here. Now I am in the position of probably having to go to the swift school and work there for a year in order to get in.

When I was in my forklift training class, it was also taught by the driving teacher and the driving students were in there as well. One of the driving students told me that he had applied to Interstate and didn't explain some sort of over lap in two jobs he had and Interstate accused him of falsifying his app. And of course didn't hire him. He did get hired on at Gordon tho. Jesus. What the hell is it with this area (the grants pass, medford area). I have found this to be a very weird area in comparison to california. Who gives a flying **** if I had four jobs recently. They were all crappy survival jobs that i couldn't live off of anyway. Who gives a flying **** if you took some time off! Give me a Break.

I have been here over a year, living with my parents and no one has been willing to hire me. I have been out of work almost this whole time... I hear it echoed over and over again from others who are unable to find work. Even the job counsel lady admitted that it is a weird and very difficult area job wise, and admitting knowing that, she still turned me down and refused to help. Its like Hitler town.... in the short amount time I've lived here they have made me feel like some kind of felon... not sure what kind if crime I committed but I'm Guilty! Yeah, I've committed a serious crime alright....the crime of living in the natural flow of life.

And never in my life have I ever lived in a county (in both the grants pass and medford counties) that was so tight fisted and cheap that all the libraries have been closed due to the voters refusal to fund them. Bunch of cheap and greedy retired people who have their fists wrapped tightly around their wad of money. I am actually starting to miss california.

 

Evidently you haven't been here in awhile

 

If you are out in that part of the country DO NOT , I REPEAT DO NOT FOR ANY REASON GO TO WORK FOR NAVAJO , DIGBY , OR ANY COMPANY HAVING ANYTHING TO DO WITH DIGBY /NAVAJO I DONT CARE WHAT THEY OFFER YOU DO NOT WORK FOR THEM , IF YOU HAVE A FAMILY , THEY WILL END UP ON THE STREET IF YOU WORK FOR THIS COMPANY . I will be doing a rather detailed post on Navajo .

 

Gordon Trucking was the first company I worked for coming out of school(AIT). At the time, I don't know about now, it was the best starting pay from a company that would hire you straight out of school. Over all, I was pretty happy with them.

They don't seem to "chase" down potential drivers. I know that I pursued them relentlessly. I had a very good trainer. The trainer is awake and sitting in the passenger seat when you are driving. When you are out of hours...that's where you stop. Running as a team when you are trying to train is just wrong. The truck they gave me when I went out on my own was well used, but in good condition. It had good rubber all the way around. Generally all the trailers I came across where in good condition. Some of the pups they had where not so great(rarely had to pull doubles, but happened on occasion for Mervyn's runs).

As with most typical otr companies they credit you 1 day off per 6 out, and want you out for 14 days. At first I was on a regional fleet for the 3 left hand states plus, AZ, NV, and UT. Within 3 weeks I met some other drivers that where on a southwest regional fleet that Gordon doesn't advertise. I called the guy in charge of that fleet and was placed on it within 3 days. They ran AZ, NV, UT, and southern CA mostly. It was nice to be able to do some fill in on the dedicated accounts as a greenhorn. Either way, this allowed me to be home pretty much every weekend. I took a little hit on the miles, but I still maintained around 2200 or so for the most part.

The only time I had a problem with them was right before I left. I didn't leave because of this incident, as I had already gave them a two week notice because I had a local job become available to me. My fifth wheel broke on me. I couldn't hook another trailer. They sent me down to freightliner to turn it in and pick up another truck that was repaired. This was a friday btw. Once I get there I find out this other truck has expired registration and the brakes are frozen on it.

They put me up in a motel for the night. The next day they still hadn't fixed the other truck, nor did they get me the registration like they said they would(first they said a local would bring it...then they said they would fax it). I waited all day to no avail. The truck was never fixed and no registration was faxed. It was getting into evening, so I told them I wanted a motel again. Understand, that now I'm dealing with a general joe blow dispatcher now...and as you might have guessed...he refused. He told me the truck should be done by midnight, and to just sleep in the truck.

If there was somewhere to at least eat. I wouldn't have had much problem doing that. Anyway, the next morning I wake up and let dispatch know that I still haven't received the faxed registration. (The truck did get fixed at about 3 am btw.) Now I'm going on the 3rd day of being at this #### place not making diddly(break down pay is hardly adequate), and this dispatcher tells me I have to wait until noon until someone comes in that can fax the registration.

I said no thanks and I informed him that they could get someone else to pick up their truck. I turned the keys back into the shop, called a cab to get to a rental car, and drove home.

Monday morning I called my normal dispatcher. She applogized for how things went down, but she didn't have a truck available locally for a couple days. In the end she said that I was free to go ahead and start working for my new company a week early, and I was welcome to come back any time. Gordon did reimburse me for the cab and the rental car, and as far as I know I left on good terms with them.

Nov. 1st I was layed off from the local job I was doing because the housing market crashed. In a couple weeks I will be starting a with a new employer making 200 a day, home every night, and off every weekend. One thing I love about trucking...there is always "something" available, and if you look hard enough you can land a pretty decent gig.

Sorry this got long winded...

 

Keep applying and keep your eyes open! Try Hendrickson. As far as Interstate Dist. they cater to teams (i'm a solo) and the solo's get the bottom of the barrel.... no joke..... They do have nice trucks that are loaded, but at what price?.?. There are some carriers out there that are very picky on who they hire, CRETE and now it sounds like Gordon also. You live in Sacramento, so try May, Knight and there are alot of carriers running up and down the I-5 corridor. Good Luck

 

As a current GTI driver. Recruitment doesnt like any gaps in their application and not more then 1 employer in the last year and 2 in last 3 years. There kinda finicky about this (but have made exceptions for driver referrals). No DUI's no failed drug tests, accidents and tickets got to be fairly clean. But when you look at our safety record you can imagine why were kind of picky at who we hire. Go out on any interstate and see how many GTI trucks you see upside down. Very rare, its usually Swift or Fed Ex or some punjab container hauler with a wobbly trailer tire and no trailer lights. The last I heard GTI was the 2nd safest motor carrier in the nation (Wal*Mart beats us by 1%) and regularly Washington States MotorCarrier of the Year. So those with crappy employment histories (I know I used to be one), work for someone for a year (I worked for Schneider), and when all that orange paint starts wearing on ya, then you can apply to GTI. GTI is really not slated as a beginner company and we have no CDL mill training school (like Swift, England). If you got your license already (or our pre-hiring thru a government training school-college-class) then if your clean record they will start looking at you.

 

Not to completely burst your bubble here, but I have seen more messed up backing/park jobs by GTI in the PNW than any other company. I had one park next to me in Tumwater, not the Pilot, but the other place, took up enough space to fit three trucks and trailers in. Not to say that it pissed me off, but if I was coming in late at night and saw a GTI parked sideways like that in three spaces, I wouldn't have been happy, down in Corning at the TA some GTI nosed in sideways and took up two spots and part of the lane, another pulled in and parked in another drive lane and all kinds of wierd stuff. I asked on the CB what was the deal with GTI parking all crazy and I was told they do that down there because they pay TA money.

Don't get me wrong, nice people, but they need to have classes on parking, or maybe there is a reason to their parking jobs that I haven't seen yet, or heard about.