Attention all company drivers!!!

What is the sense of having this forum if a driver is so intimidated by trucking companies, that they cannot reveal their identity? YOUR ADVICE EXPOSES A LOT ABOUT THE TRUCKING INDUSTRY.

 

Alright company drivers, keep your personal info to yourself and keep exposing the trash!

 

For to many years now its been an uneven playing field for drivers looking for a decent company to work for. now we have csa driver records, and of course dont forget our friends at dac. the companies have been able to access any drivers records and any false reports that companies that want to destroy a drivers record for life make to dac.
Now thanks to this forum and the fine folks that run it,, we have a way to check them out. granted some drivers are just venting and probably need to get another line of work started but if a portion of what is said here is true and it saves one driver from signing on with the devil,, then mission accomplished.
Like I said in my thread,, this is to be taken with a grain of salt, we dont need to bully others or call them names or suggest they are all liars.Just read what they say, store it and keep it for future references,
Happy Motoring

 

I'll disagree with you, if someone is badmouthing your company and their information is total BS that person should be called out. No need in letting someone slander a company.

 

I saw there was somebody inquiring about
Gordon Trucking vs Bear Trucking
I was very happy at Bear when Eddie James was running things. When he died Sonny Woodall took over the business The only thing that remained the same was the company name & logo. I'm not the only one who despite needing the work had to seek employment elsewhere. That guy is a real sob. Goodluck

 

Most trucking companies read here for sure so what. It's good to say what you feel but remember what is bad for you may not be bad for someone else. A lot of cry babies out here and there is some good information so read each post and then you decide. Also remember recruiters post on here and make you think there drivers when their protecting a company. enough said. Do your home work find a company and stick with it. If you keep hoping around your DAC will show it and you'll never get hired. Just like any other job. Trucking is an art. Your either good at it or your not. If your not, find a new job. No whining just the facts ok

 

I have nothing bad to say about Boyd other than that big-wig Mr.Gunter will ditch at you for idle. In most defense for most driver's their battery APU died in 105+ temps.

 

Excellent info, do you know what they do once they read the site?

 

I am gonna post this information about three different companies I have worked for. These three companies use elogs and paper logs so I have seen both sides of the playing field.

I started trucking in 2007. In June I went to a small truck driving school in Paducah, Ky, they are out of business now. They wanted me to go to work for Red Star and make 350 a week while training just like most big companies, AKA Cheap Teams!

I decided to do my own thing I went to the nearest truck stop got me a book with all the companies hiring newly grads. I got a phone from Covenant Transportation, and US Xpress. At the time I did not know that both companies was owned by the same family, brothers. Well Covenant paid me at 14 cents a mile as a student instead of what most companies would of paid me at 350 some 400 and some 450. Well I went to work for Covenant and made about 750 a week as a student. than I had to go out with another driver and run teams and got paid 17 cents after my trainer truck and after about a month with the other driver my pay went to 21 cents a mile. I thought I was doing great, until we would do our pretrips and post trips call break down and report a bad trailer tire and Covenant would tell us to go to a truck stop and have them take pictures and they would let us know if they would change the tire or tires.

Most of the time they would not change them, so going down the road and the tire blows Covenant would say that tires dont just blow, the driver had to hit something on the interstate and would count this as an accident and charge the driver 500 dollars at 100 dollars a week for the 500 deductible on their insurance policy. After three Covenant said they would have to fire me if I had another blow out! So I quit and could not get another otr job so I went to work for Manpower til Knight Transportation would hire me.

Knight as a no idle at all policy, the more you idle the slower your truck goes. I told Knight to put APUs in our trucks like Covenant had so we would not idle. Knight said no that it was not suffiecient enough for economy means. Said it costs about 15000 for the units and have them put in. It only costs over a gallon of diesel to idle, but Knight has their trucks set up to where its almost impossible to get them to idle due to the fact they think you can get a good night sleep in a semi if you go into the truck stop and buy a small fan while you are in Az on I 10 in the middle of summer. Knight and Covenant both told me that the most miles a driver can legally log aweek is about 3000. Some weeks you might get 3000 but most weeks will be under 2800. They say the pay for dention and lay over. I was at the time actually happy to an extend working for Knight! Til I got a phone call from one of my ads on Craigslist.

The company I work for now is Fischer Transportation out of Ft. Wayne, In. My ad read some what to these lines. i am a company driver with x amount of years as an otr trucker. I want to become an owner operator with the right company, or find a smaller company, one that respects the drivers, where we got more dispatchers then drivers, My mentailly is if you got more dispatchers than drivers I should have no problem with keeping my truck moving. Realisticly you will always have more drivers than dispatchers, but if I set my goals high enough no company in the world would be able to meet them, but there will be one or two that will surely try too, and those are the companies that I wanted to find! Well Fischer called me. I make the exact same pay for Fischer that I did at Knight. 32 cents a mile, I run the exact same routes for both companies, however I got two very seperate paychecks from both companies. At Knight running 3000 miles at 32 cents a mile is 960 a week after taxes and insurance I would make about 650. At Fischer I get what Knight and Covenant says they pay, but don't!

My Paycheck with Fischer is as follows

Mileage pay is .32 Mileage Driven for week 3000
Dentention time hourly rage $15.00 Dentention for the week is 20 hours
Layover is $50.00 an hour Layover pay for week 0
Van Equiptment pay for the week 0

Total amount payable to driver this week is 1260!

Now remember Knight and Covenant both said they paid dentention too but not one of my paychecks ever showed dentention time.

Knight mileage pay from Indy, In to Baltimore, Md 585 miles, Fischer pays almost 700 miles for this same run, I have several paychecks from Fischer where I ran close to 6000 miles a week and some over 6000 miles a week and those checks have been over two thousand dollars, now some steering wheel holders will say a Solo driver cant log 6000 miles a week legally, and there some teams out there that dont get 6000 miles a week teaming. Its not that you cant legally log it a week its that your current company won't allow you to run it a week.

I even had several drivers tell me that DOT will get me at a scale houes for this. Well if DOT had a problem with me running 6000 miles a week how come Cali Dot gave me a yellow sticker on my truck and trailer on June 7th, 2012 on I 80 at Donner pass Scale house at 2 AM local time.

For those drivers who say you can't legally do it, you are right you can't legally log it when your truck only goes 62 mph or 65 mph. Tell your companies to let your trucks do the speed limit in every state and you would be able to run it legally!

Also I have a 2013 Kenworth T- 660, I hear alot of drivers talk about fuel mileage and how much they get a mile. I got a brand new 2013 Kenworth with a MX Engine in it. I am suppose to be getting the best fuel mileage in the industry. I have been deadheaded from Denver, Co to Ft. Wayne, In my truck the best Mileage I can get out of my truck is 6.8 miles a gallon dead head, When I am in the mountains and my load is 40,000 or more I only get 5.8 miles a gallon, when I got 30000 to 40000 lbs in my truck in the mountains coast to coast I get 6.3 miles a gallon,
When I got under 20,000 lbs I get about 6.5 miles a gallon.

Now heres the kicker, I get my best fuel a mile between 74 miles an hour up to 80 miles an hour! Drivers are always asking me why I don't drive under 65 miles even when the speed tells us 55 aka Cali, city limits, and construction zones. Heres what I tell them at 55 miles an hour no matter if I am empty or loaded I only get 4.9 miles a gallon of diesel, at 45 miles I get 4.5 at 35 mph I only get 3.1 at 25 mphs per hour I only get 2.5. So everyone says the slower you go the better fuel your suppose to get but not in today's technology. The faster my truck goes the better fuel mileage I get keep in mind until I 80 mphs than at 81 I start to drop to 5.9 and so so and so on.

And for those drivers who say the speed limit is never 80 for semis in America, my question is have you been on I 10 lately, or I 15 Cali is 55 of course, Nevada is 80 til you reach Los Vegas than 65 for the city limits than back to 80 til you get to Salt Lake Utah, or I 70. I 10 in Arizona is 75 in Texas its 80 til you reach San Antonio than 80 til Houston. But I got a lead foot I also drive 5 over the speed limit even with the CSA and other HOS!

The reason and only reason why I am leaving Fischer is to become an owner operator! There is two reasons why drivers leave Fischer, one is too retire and the other is to start our own business, and with the New HOS starting in JAn. 2013 only way any driver will be able to make it out here with the raising cost at the truck stops and what it takes to survive on the road weekly only O/Os will be able too! Mark my Words! The days of company drivers making over 800 a week is gonna be history in 2013!

 

HI my name is tammy and I'm going to be starting school to get my CDL what are some Good Companies to go to please help me