Arnold Drivers, What's your 20?

FM advises freight is slow out of VA today. It's the day after the Labor Day weekend, so no real surprise. Maybe we can find a mall with movies nearby...

 

Tonight we are in Findlay,OH after dropping one at the Home Depot DC that we brought from Harrisburg,PA. However, no empties til they unload one, so our preplan from OH to the Jersey side of Philly looks iffy. Lee Gomez told me to not send an empty call and stay on detention. You know, that fictional $12hr we are supposed to get after 2hrs? Typical Friday. 600mi over 3 days. FM assured me there would be preplans on me today for after empty near Philly. It's bad enough that we had hometime scheduled for this weekend for family plans and FM failed again.
Now, I've rescheduled plans for next weekend. I'll be so glad to turn this truck in and never have to deal with these incompetent clowns again.

 

Still in Findlay,OH. Load taken away since I have no empty. Home Depot security advised no empties this morning. Stuck here til Monday? We were supposed to be home this weekend. Good job, Arnold.

 

Richie theres a Lowes DC in Findlay that may have empties. I used to live in Marion, OH and was always going to the Lowes.

 

We finally got an empty from the Toledo airport late on Saturday after Barry Knight, one of the few competent ops people, scoped it out for us. Then we got the same load we had been "preplanned" on as of Friday, OH to NJ, across the river from Philly. No worries until the rent-a-cops at the receiver advised we could not take an empty without a "release number" from Arnold.
WTF? Ok, so I immediately sent a msg to FM before we even dropped the loaded trailer..... TWO HOURS later, no response. I already had picked the best of 3 emptys and sent GP ops the number. After multiple msgs, I finally dial 'em up. Thankfully, I got thru to Barry Knight after being on hold, disconnected, and re-trying the call. I asked to speak to Mr Gomez, the "Fleet Owner". BK got to him just as Gomez was going into a meeting. Gomez had him tell me that he would call me in 20min, as soon as the meeting was over. As with other times, he did not call.
However, Barry had me a release number and a load from NE PA to STL in 10 MINUTES! Now, why can he manage that when my own FM can't even manage to answer routine msg traffic?

I would not be surprised to find that Provost & Gomez would rather I resign, since the working relationship has deteriorated so much. It does surprise me that they seem to find it difficult to perform their assigned duties with regard to myself and the truck I'm assigned to. I have zero accidents, zero service failures, zero customer complaints, and zero tickets. I handle my assigned missions, even given the poor nature of our working relationship. It speaks volumes about the lack of professionalism and dysfunctional nature of Grand Prairie Ops.

 

I run out of Jacksonville and soo I dont have those issues unless Im in the Grand Prairie running area and thats only been as of lately in the past few months. Ive been in Texas the last few weeks and have had the same Texas planner give me 3 preplans then before he leaves the office after Jacksonville leaves and the day of or before I delivered took the loads away without notifying anyone. I dont know how you guys from Grand Prairie put up with the stupidity. But I will say there are miles there to be had because Ive been running them. They were just hesitant on sending me back east to Jacksonvilles board.

 

I forgot to mention the new pay packages. I've been asking FM & FO about the new pay pkgs after having a sitdown with the HR dept head a few weeks ago. He told me that FMs were supposed to be telling drivers their options for the new pay. Mine has pleaded ignorance, the most honest statement yet. Once again, Barry Knight comes through and gave me the straight info. Hump-The-Dock pay will go away. new pay scale .36-.40 based on exp. Heads up: Per-Diem will be forced and they will take .03mi out of your pay to offset the cost involved with a per-diem program. Do you smell what Arnold is cooking? USX processes payroll every week and it costs them nothing to do per-diem, but they are saving on the employer side of what they have to pay the IRS. But to charge drivers a fee is theft by consent. Bad idea.

 

Well you know your screwed when you get a message at 07:00 saying your fm is out today so you your driver tech. You use it and still no reply. Call Gp yard and get put on hold for 45 minutes to be transferred to a voice mail where you still haven't gotten any reply.
And the .03 to process my pay roll. They are full of ####. I have taken advance 3 times since I been here did you know they charge you $2.00 or $2.50 for it? Seems they will next be charging for a direct deposit of your check.

 

Well put, ANJ. I asked to be transferred to Jax months ago, but no dice. Too bad...
I finally got my home-load from MO to Plainview.TX. WM DC to DC move. Sched to del today, but I'm home on MY time now. When I sent the loaded call, I indicated I could not del on time and put in a del eta of 09/15 1300. No response. Stop for the mandated DOT lunch and send another msg to let Provost know I'd be taking Sunday off too, and asking if they would like to setup a repower or maybe drop it at the OKC drop yard. 4hrs later we arrive home and no reply on the 'puter.... I don't know what more I can do.
I have e-mailed several members of management regarding the ongoing problems with FM & FO, but no response.
When I got home, I looked at my settlement sheets for the $50 the CEO promised when we had the fuel filter problem at the GP shop several weeks ago. Not there. I reckon I can now add Todd Smith to the list of liars I've dealt with at GP. Sheesh, if the CEO can't deliver on a simple $50 bonus, this organization truly is FUBAR.
I called HR yesterday to initiate a complaint. Nicole asked some questions, and said she would have her boss call me. No call-back. That's the best thing about Arnold, you can count on them to do nothing. "Stop, Drop, Resolve" is nothing more than a BS slogan, reminiscent of a Communist propaganda poster.