mercer transportation

I was in the First Orientation that Required ELD's i ran with it for about 1 1/2 weeks then had a problem went back to paper till JJ Keller worked it out, but.. What a Major Change for me, No Matter How the rules have changed I've always ran what's most safe for me as a individual If i'm tired i sleep if i'm not i drive, not only that going to a place like Dallas, i parked at the pay to park spot with IdleAir cuz its free if you use idleair, but it was 15 miles to deliver monday morning and I'm not getting up at 6am to drive into downtown dallas, i'm getting up at 4am to avoid traffic get to the customer roll up my straps and lay back down till they get to work at 8, but that ELD has me starting my day now at 4am.. which had i been on paper wouldn't have been the case, thats just 1 example, I'm also accustomed to basically reaching a set mileage every day doing OTR i like to turn 700mi a day at a speed that helps me maintain 7.5mpg. in Reality aka ELD that's not possible but that adjustment hasn't been so bad minor changes still driving slow Under 60 just making Achievable ETA's to be honest has not impacted my bottom line, I'm now trying to figure out what to do with all my free time after being used to waking up throwing on shoes jumping into the driver seat and going now i got 3hr most of the time b4 my 10hr break is up.. kinda nice now i can wake up strech walk, cook a real breakfast on the truck its a healthy change i just wish there was more flexability with the HOS but i also understand some people just done have the ability to Drive Responsibly which is why were in the situation we are now, its a change but i'm making the best of it

 

I hope you are right. But every major change since taking away multiple drivers license has been sold that it will weed out bad drivers and raise rates. All I see is the carriers will lower their hiring standards even lower and get creative in filling the seats.

More immigrants, any Tom, Dick and Harry going thru a few weeks of training. Then being put out on the road and being abused by the carriers. Very few carriers have the integrity that Mercer does, most don't expect honesty to go both ways.


SPEED LIMITERS WILL BE NEXT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Like I said, I hope you are right.

 

roshea - thanks for the info, called and got the list from Lisa. Funny gal ...

flightline - ###### man! if it's gonna be $2 per mile min then I don't think we're going to be able to turn it down this year! LOL Hubby and I run team for UPS and can get some serious miles in, especially at that rate! But (no offense), I'm not gonna hold my breath. We'll just wait and see.

We might not get as many miles in this year because hubby want's to go ahead and get the EOBR put on the truck. Not sure how that's going to affect our driving time/styles.

As far as the UPS scheduling goes, with the loads we were on, there was a built in 1 - 1.5 hours, but when a load is ready late, it throws off the whole schedule. Usually we'd be doing anywhere from 2-6 drop & hooks in a run.

Ah well, we shall see.

 

Yea, I guess I'll be doing UPS one more time also. Not gona like it.
But maybe I'll get me some of those LED headlights and make it look like daytime in front of me.
And maybe I'll make enough to just take January completly off.

 

Heh, I hear ya on taking January off. Typically that's what we've done after running UPS. Just take the whole month of January off and relax. Went to Florida last year to visit my family. Will probably just stay home and do some "projects" here around the house this time. Lord knows there's enough around here to be done, even if there is snow on the ground! LOL

 

I put led lights in my 98 century and it's made a huge difference in night driving. I upgraded headlights years ago to do away from p.o.s. sealed beams and that was a huge difference. This was ten times better than that upgrade.

 

why in the world is your goal to run 700 miles a day??? you got to get get mercerized.

it is possible to make money while running 2000 miles a week or less max. get out of the mileage mentality and into revenue mentalit. the least amount of miles for the most revenue

 

on another note, I drove my 4 wheeler to okie city last Wednesday (1040 miles) to take daughter to the world and national morgan horse show, just got back today.

while there she won reserve world champion in dressage, and reserve national champion in gold medal class dressage, turned out to be a very good week on the horse end of things.

heres the bad news, there are some completely ####### truck drivers out there, tailgating, lane changes with no signals and on and on. been a great while since I drove a 4 wheeler that far.

I got to say , its no dang wonder the world is out to get us. the very worst of the offenders???? the mega carriers and larger fleets, complete bozos. truly and honestly the ones who were driving like they had a brain were the mercers and landstars, and the like from the owner op outfits.

I got some dashcam video to send to 4 companies in particular, those 4 stood out as absolute maniacs. I see stupidity everyday in the kw but from the perspective from a four wheeler, I saw it from a whole different view

 

I felt the same in a rental car from NY to CA a few weeks ago. I was thinking no wonder everyone hates us. We all see these things everyday but it's when you drive long distance in a car, you realize that it's shocking we don't have more accidents.

 

100% Agree! Hubby left the house on Tuesday. He picks up his 2nd load in the morning, delivers on Monday. Total Miles (including DH) 2,228 ... Revenue to the Truck $4,707.51. Easy peasy loads that he doesn't have to run his butt off to do either. I know we ain't makin a fortune, but hey .. I sure as heck ain't gonna complain about clearing over $800 off the first load and (by my estimates) another $1,500+ off the second load.

Sure ain't no need to drive yourself into the ground to make money at Mercer!