Any Info about Heartland Express??

mostly money

 

If you don't mind me asking, what is his rate per mile pay and miles per week, average weekly pay? I can compare. also how often is he at home and for how long?

 

First of all, are you saying the 1-2 wk refresher is good enough for the insurance? I am OK with that. Been out for 5 yrs, did team driving before.

I am just anxious. Will let ya know what happens.

 

I've been working with Heartland for one month. I realize I only have a year and a half of 'true' experience, but I am a 3rd generation OTR driver, with 5 uncles, father, and 2 grandfathers who all have over 3 million safe miles, and I've frequently rode around with each of them, and had a rare glimpse into each companies and the nonsense associated with each.

I called the recruiter Andrew Miller, and was very specific about the things I wanted from a company, and asked many questions before even allowing him to fill out an application on my behalf. I made several points clear, that I wanted to split my home time between Iowa City, IA, and Duluth, MN, twice a month each, and for him to double check with the operations division to make sure that this was a certainty and not a 'maybe'. I was also mislead on the pay rate, as the 'safety bonus', pays out only after 1 year, and it includes any log violations that the COMPANY found, not D.O.T. I was also told I would be paid for orientation, and reimbursement for travel to and from orientation. Lastly, I inquired about the regional running area. I was told "Iowa and every state surrounding it."

Starting at Heartland, I am from Iowa City, near their corporate office, I asked for reimbursement for my daily taxi to and from the terminal as it was about equal to the cost of the hotel room they wanted to put me into. I was given approval, and I turned in my receipts. On the second day of orientation, they informed me that they would NOT continue reimbursements for any taxis, nor pay for the first 3 trips, nor be paying me for orientation. In orientation, they also informed me that I 'could' be running as far west as Denver, CO, Butte, MT, Dallas, TX, Atlanta, GA, Carlisle, PA.... and the biggest lie (to me, that is) was that I could get to Duluth, MN every other week. As this was a major factor in leaving my last company to join this company, I was very distraught.

Getting into the truck, there were some major and minor issues to be addressed with it before even running with it, from spent fire extinguishers, broken head lamps, tail lamps, marker lamps, and a leaky radiator and passenger steer tire. The truck had 247,000 miles on it, which isn't bad for a 2010, but it had no creature comforts. No fridge, no bunk heater, and worst of all, power inverters are against company policy! Even the cigarette adapter styles! They have an idle system that lets the truck run below 45 degrees, or above 72 degrees, but if your idle time exceeds your driving time, it will govern your engine at 62 rather than 64 mph, which becomes an issue in the winter months, especially since there are times when you have to wait a day for a load. This has happened twice with this company in the 5 weeks with them, and I have been refused "Heartland Cares" for both.

When asking for home time, it's always an issue, and I've asked for each home time two weeks in advance, and every time, it's a day late, and at midnight to 1am. I live near a terminal so this shouldn't be an issue in the least!!

Twice I have been told to either pick up or deliver a load while on my 10 hour break, and if I refuse, I get harrassed my entire break "why aren't you moving??"

I've had 1 week at 3100 miles, 2nd at 1800, 3rd at 2800, 4th at 2780, and 5th at 2800. It's very true that they will work off every second on your 70 hour clock, to the point of violation every day. They say routing is at 45mph, but often it doesn't include extra things you need to do for customers like sweeping out trailers, double drop hooks, or repairing equipment.

If you blow a tire, and get it replaced, they still require you to drag that flat around with you, switching from trailer to trailer belly until you return to a terminal.

Also, at every terminal they require you to go through an inspection lane, which I would normally say is a plus, to keep my equipment in top running shape, but frequently, the line is 3, 4, 5 trucks deep, and each one takes a minimum of 30 minutes, and can take up to an hour per truck!

They only do paper checks or direct deposit. They don't have a company pay card. That get's annoying. Tolls are rarely authorized. I88 and the skyway in Chicago are never authorized. Scale tickets are reimbursed, but you have to watch the company, because they tend to 'forget'. Paychecks are always 1 week behind the week you haul. If you pick hometime for a Wednesday, they hold your pay till the Friday AFTER the Friday you would have been paid.

They don't have pre-pass. They use the Flying J/ Pilot for fuel, and TA for repairs. Breakdown and Claims are some crabby jerks, and it usually takes 30-45 minutes on hold before ever getting ahold of them.

All-in-all, I am not impressed with this company. Expect them to abuse you, lie to you, and expect you to bend rules and laws, yet not directly tell you to do that, for plausible deniability. Don't expect home time, or at least to expect having to fight for it, and nearly run out of hours of service to do it.

---- Already looking for a new company

 

Well...on a positive note..

Your miles are much better than any other heartland driver I have heard from so far...

 

Wow!! This is not the kind of thing Gordon Trucking drivers want to see. If anything, Heartland seems to have a driver public relations nightmare! Where are all the "positives"? I'm waiting...

Tow is right about the miles part! Are those miles run? Miles paid? Do you get paid short or practical miles?

 

Yes, Actually, after hearing all of the initial 'bad things' about them, I was looking into Gordon Trucking, only to hear a week after being hired, Heartland purchased them. >.<

I do get plenty of miles... more than I want, actually? I wanted somewhere around 2500, and it's working out to be far more than I wanted.

I'm a hard worker, especially when I need to be. On any given day, I'll drive a 600 mile day. I'll also drive for 7 days before getting 2 or 3 days off, so maybe my mileage is skewed a little... but that's what my paychecks say each week?

I am lazy, too, which is why I became a truck driver. I spent many years watching family members go out for weeks and months at a time coming home with thick wallets and nice toys, which is what really entertained me in joining trucking in the first place.

I have also heard about the many changes in a short period of time with the industry, and as it happens, most of those relatives have passed or moved onto local jobs to be with wives and kids.

This is not what I expected, nor what I signed up for...

Now I'm also looking into local jobs, or buying my own rig and trying the market for myself.

 

xsynfulx that post brought back some painful memories. I went through it all too.

 

They have a few pet drivers that are happy. They drop and hook from the Iowa hard to the Columbus yard that other System drivers picked up for them. Those drivers are happy. Rest of the other drivers just grumbling to each other about it while at the terminal.

 

I have been working for Heartland for about 2 months as well and my main complaint is how much unpaid time they punish me with. Today was typical:

i was was empty at Family Dollar, Morehead KY at 9am. There were no empties, and my next load was in Florence, KY. I waited several hours and made multiple phone calls trying to find out from dispatch where to get an empty. Finally they sent me to a drop yard in Louisville (138 miles - not in the direction of Florence).

i got there and of course there was no empty. Several more phone calls. My regular dispatcher was irritated and said "we're working on it". 1.5 hours later I called in to get an update, found out he had gone home and no one was doing anything. Another hour later they sent me a message to bobtail to the customer in Florence.

i called up dispatch to confirm, because I had been told earlier to specifically not bobtail to that shipper. I talked to "Scott" who was incredibly rude and patronizing and told me to bobtail over, yet when I asked him if the shipper would allow that, he became pissy, said "I don't know" and then hung up.

i called back and got a lady and she assured me "oh yes, my supervisor has authorized you to bobtail to the customer". So now I bobtail over another 96 miles to Florence. Sure enough, as soon as I arrived, the guard said "under no circumstances can you pick up a load without an empty" (BTW, dispatch had told me the load wouldn't be ready until 10am Sunday, but the guard immediately said "oh yeah, that trailer was loaded yesterday (Friday)."

After another hour of waiting, dispatch sent me across town to a Sam's Club store where they said there was an empty. I got there, made contact and a very nice lady took me to the back where we raised the dock doors and checked both Heartland trailers. Of course both were fully loaded all the way to the back.

By now it was 8:30 pm, my whole 14 gone doing a variety of wild goose chases and waiting multiple hours in nondescript muddy lots. I will say that I am making more money at this company (than I was making at Crete) because of the higher CPM. But I'm not sure the endless hours of torture are worth it - also, I am pretty sure they are shorting me on paid miles big time. Most trips I have to route around toll roads, but their HHG miles especially around Chicago pay based on those significantly shorter miles. For every 3000 miles I drive, I am paid for about 2200. And I am taking every back road and state highway.

* In my 2 months so far, this has not been unusual and usually a variation of this insanity occurs 2-3 times a week.