Swift - Starting the New Year training with Swift 1/7/13 - A long read...

I can only really speak about Swift since I don't have any other reference point. It's the only company I have worked for so far.

I've heard complaints about Swift and I've heard good things. I guess worse case scenario you put some time in there, get some experience and if it's not working out for you guys you switch companies. That's kind of my attitude and plans with this whole thing. I wish I could be more help. I'm currently kind of pissed at Swift so I'm not sure if I'm the best person to ask about them right now....read on...

 

So I'm currently pretty pissed off at Swift due to the way my need to get home was treated. I'm currently on hometime in Virginia but it wasn't easy getting here. But let me back up a little...

I was making a trajectory across the country heading southwest. I bounced around with loads in Texas going around the areas of Amarillo south to Odessa and Midland. I felt like I was stuck in this area for about a week. Things were slow, loads were kind of short and they deadheaded me up from south of Lubbock north of Amarillo. I finally got my truck washed at a Blue Beacon - Amarillo East. Despite the 2+ hour wait in line and the subsequent wash, my truck was finally cleaned. It hadn't been washed since before I went sliding down I-70 in a snow storm in Colorado. I spent that night due north at a Walmart east of my pickup the following morning in a town that sounded like Burger, Texas.

I got live loaded late after the Swift directions, Qualcomm GPS and address sent me to the wrong plant in town. I headed down to Amarillo to scale the load. It was the opposite direction that I needed to go, southwest towards Dallas but there was a scale house enroute (287?) and I had to make sure this nearly 45,000 lb. load would scale correctly before I began my trip. So I followed the GPS directions down to a Pilot in Amarillo to scale my load.

Along the way I was directed down some small farm roads northeast of Amarillo. I turned on one and about 1/4 mile down there was a truck restriction. No vehicles over 14 tons or something. I stopped and put on my 4 ways as I considered my options. I couldn't safely back up and make the turn in reverse back onto the road in which I came. My only option seemed to be to go forwards until I could turn off this road onto a more truck worthy route. I figured if I came up to a bridge or something then I would have to do the inevitable and back all the way up the road and initiate plan A. That plan I didn't want to begin with. As it turned out, there were no bridges and nothing crazy. It was just a small farm road. I approached a T in the road up ahead. I made a right but I did see something that caught my eye straight ahead. It was a very secure looking guard booth and gate. Military-like. My interest was piqued.

I made the right and immediately began seeing signs along the barbed wire, 4' high cattle fence that read...
"No trespassing. Lethal force is authorized"....or something to that effect.

Every 50 feet or so there was another sign that said the same thing. This seemed to go on for at least a mile as I shouldered the protected property to my left. I kept a slow pace trying to determine just what was out there whereby an intruder would be killed for trespassing. The signs were official and not that of a simple property owner. There were mounds off in the distance. Bunkers it appeared covered with the vegetation that covered the rest of the property. Way off in the distance I could make out some structures but it was hard to tell what they were. I scanned the property continuously and could make out what looked like some kind of motion sensors out in the fields. AT least that's what I thought they were. Eventually I made my way back to the interstate to head to the Pilot to scale my load. Two runs over the scales later my load scaled within 20 lbs on my trailer. My tandems were almost all the way back so I was relieved as I didn't have much room to play with on the tandem holes.

I later looked up that secure facility with all the security measures and found out that it was the Pantex Plant north of Amarillo. It is a very secure facility where house the materials needed to make atomic bombs. Pretty interesting and I'm glad I didn't start taking pictures because most likely I was being watched very closely. Interesting.

They had me t-calling this load down in Dallas. The final destination was down southeast of Houston. The load was to deliver the day after the t-call, early in the morning. I was already running late because I got the dispatch late and because of the misdirections and the load time. Not only was the t-call not going to get there that night but it didn't make sense for me to t-call it and waste the time of dropping the trailer at the terminal, bringing in the paperwork and then someone else hooking up to the trailer to bring it the remaining way down to Houston. It made more sense for me to drive what I could, take my 10 and then continue driving it all the way down to the final destination. I explained this to my driver manager and others at the terminal and after a lot of back and forth they finally and reluctantly said for me to take it down to the final. In addition to the time aspect it just didn't make sense that I put in all the work of getting misdirected to the pickup, waiting for the live load, scaling the load, etc. just for someone else to take it on the final easy leg down to the final. I did all the work on this load, had all the headaches with it. I should take it all the way down and get the miles. Unless it was a repower of some type to get it there on time, it just didn't make sense for someone else to take the load after I t-called it. So I brought it all the way down the next day and delivered.

So I got a load out of Houston going to near Baton Rouge. I was kind of excited to be down in Louisiana again since it had been so long. My hometime was coming up soon but I had some time at this point. They were reminded of my upcoming hometime in Virginia.

I made the delivery out near Baton Rouge and stayed at a Walmart nearby. Then I sat. I was scheduled to be back in Virginia on Christmas Eve. My little brother was only going to be out in Virginia for one day while I was there before he had to go back to his army base in Kansas. He would be there Christmas Day and Eve then leaving very early in the morning on 12/26. I had to get there. Plus, this was going to be the first time my parents had all 3 of their kids together on Christmas in 11 years. 11 years!! My mom was looking forward to this so much so it was important that I got there ontime. I was stressed yet at it was Thursday or Friday and as long as I started heading up to Virginia soon I would be fine.

I had almost 1100 mile up to Virginia and I had the weekend plus Monday to get there by Tuesday 12/24.

Then the weekend came. And went. I sat at Walmart Friday afternoon. I got loads sending me up to Ohio and other places. I worked each load and each time it worked out that I would get to Virginia late, sometime after the 25th. I rejected them stating that I had hometime in Virginia and needed something more direct. I sat some more.

Saturday passed and nothing. I called and spoke to my terminal telling them I needed routing to Virginia explaining that the preplans I was receiving would put me in Virginia late. They could do nothing. Take it or leave it I was told. I sat some more.

Sunday came. Nothing. I drove over to a truckstop to shower and fuel in anticipation of having to run hard to Virginia when that load came. Nothing still.

Monday came.

At this point I was still almost 1100 miles from my hometime and was scheduled to be there the next day on Christmas Eve. I was anxious and pissed off. I was crawling out of my skin. I called and called. I had crazy thoughts going through my head out of desperation. Should I just go AWOL and run this MF'r empty up to Virginia without a load? As tempting as it was, I know my fuel would run out before and at a minimum I would get fired. They might call the police and have me stopped or arrested for taking the truck up there without a load and without permission. Should I just leave the truck and take a very expensive last minute flight up to Virginia? Not possible since not only would it cost too much and most likely I would even find a flight but the logisitics of getting my gifts onto a flight, taking a cab to the airport and the fact that I probably still wouldn't get there on time made that plan null and void. I was absolutely crawling out of my skin with anxiety and anger. I no longer cared.

I kept in touch with my mom on the phone and she was upset at the idea of me not getting there on time. Her dream of finally having her kids and family together on Christmas after all these years was doomed. I could hear it in her voice and she was upset. My parents are old Irish and are as stoic as they come. She doesn't get upset and here she was. Upset. I was enraged to say the least and helpless. Out of all the hometime request I could possibly have this was most important next to the time my mom was nearly dying in the hospital with cancer. She had a very rough year fighting this cancer and getting there ontime was the least I could do and I couldn't.

Monday came and as the morning went by they still had nothing for me. I was on the phone and messaging them constantly. I expressed to them that needed to do SOMETHING as I was feeling irrational and didn't want to act irrationally. I needed to get "home" and NOW. I was told there were no loads still.

I asked them why they couldn't deadhead me up to Memphis or somewhere where there would be a load. They had deadheaded me a week earlier from south of Amarillo all the way up to Amarillo so why couldn't they do it again?!?! Finally it came.

Go over to this lumber mill place and pick up some paper to t-call at the Memphis terminal. It was supposed to be a "drop and hook". I went over to the place immediately and there was a trailer inspection station prior to pickup. I wasn't told anything about this in the preplan comments that stated no holes in the trailer. I had swept it out and the trailer was in good shape otherwise. I backed to the trailer inspection station as instructed and the inspector went inside asking me to close the trailer doors behind them while they were inside the trailer. They found a small hole in the front top passenger side corner. I hadn't seen this earlier in my pretrip. Trailer rejected. She went inside to get me a trailer rejection form and I would have to go get the trailer repaired somewhere else. I didn't have time for this!! I paced the dock waiting for my trailer rejection from the inspector and the other drivers waiting picked up on my dire situation. We all went to work immediately. We grabbed a ladder and I went inside and pounded the bent corner. A driver came up and let me use his caulking to fill the hole. I covered it with duct tape.

When she came back out to give me the form I begged her to reinspect the trailer. I told her we had patched the hole and to please pass my trailer. With great reluctance she did, her gold toothed smile telling me it was ok to use that trailer to drop there. But, my load wasn't ready. Check back in a few hours. ####!

I ran the truck and watched a movie as I didn't care at this point about idle time. Hours later I approached her again and my trailer was ready. I went over and after a little more waiting for the yard jockey to pull my trailer out of the spot, I had dropped my empty and hooked to the loaded trailer. I was on my way to Memphis.

 

On my way to Memphis they sent me another preplan. I was a t-call pickup from the Memphis terminal going to Virginia Beach, stop 1, and terminating somewhere up in NY State. I grabbed it immediately sending my macro 9 and accepting it. I didn't care about times it delivered, picked up, etc. All I cared was it was a way to get home, something to complete that final leg to Richmond. I told them I would t-call it in Richmond as it delivered the stop 1 in Virginia Beach on 12/26. There weren't any options as this is what I had to do. They, after some delay, agreed. T-call it in Richmond.

I flew as fast as a 62 mph governed truck could go. I got to Memphis with under 1 hour left on my 11 hour clock and t-called this first load. I picked up the second load but couldn't hook up to it yet as I had to take my 10. 10 hours later I hooked up to the loaded t-call trailer and started to head east and then north up I-81 in Virginia to Richmond. Luckily Christmas Day there wasn't much traffic. I made it to the Richmond terminal on Christmas Day around 4:00 PM. Over one day late from my hometime request but I was there. I t-called the load inside, emptied my truck of what I needed, checked my truck into the prequal lane for some repairs and headed down to Norfolk. I don't usually speed but I did this time as I had over 90 miles to get to Norfolk from Richmond and everyone was waiting for me at my sis's house in Norfolk. I got there after 7:00 PM but I made it barely. I saw my brother for a few hours before he had to leave and we all spend the remaining few hours of Christmas together. Barely.

My PTA was blown out, I'm guessing by my driver manager, to 12/31. I'm guessing this was to make up for the messed up hometime timing. Who knows. I don't really care at this point as all the extra hometime in the world couldn't make up for what had happened. It wasn't my driver managers fault that this all happened. I know he did what he could and I was stressing him out when I was so stressed out in Louisiana trying to get a load home. He was off that weekend I sat waiting for a load so it wasn't him. I know this. But I do feel a part of me doesn't really care right now. It set something off in me. It's kind of liberating to not give a shi$ sometimes. I hope this changes or I'm going to have to start over again with another company. Right now there is a really sour taste in my mouth with Swift.

 

True about Lancaster but at the time I still had plenty of time to get home so I figured it would be best to get the miles. At the time of the Lancaster/Houston run I still had plenty of time to get home and my terminal manager had even called me to see if everything was on schedule. It was, at that time. It wasn't until I got the load to Baton Rouge that it all went to hell.

In retrospect, if the hometime is important as this one was, then I would rather get to the area of the hometime early if necessary. Lesson learned. I'm guessing that other than the Georgia Pacific plant near Baton Rouge there isn't a whole lot going on with freight around there.