How much do trainers get paid?

At Swift you get paid your mileage rate, whether you drive or the student drives. After the student gets 50 hours behind the wheel it is your option to qualify them to drive as team. I always had a weaning process when first running as team, sleeping with my clothes on and the curtain open.

It is tiring to be a trainer. You REALLY have to love teaching before even considering it.

 

When I was a trainer at Stevens Transport, I got paid for all the miles that the truck made at my regular rate. The student got a flat $400 per week, paid by the company not by me. If they had a good day, I'd buy their dinner out of my pocket. Also, if they were a good student (really applied themselves, eager to learn the trade etc.) I'd buy them a XM radio or a CB on the last week to help prepare them for their solo truck.

Stevens also had very strict rules about running with a student. The truck (me and student combined) could only run for 17 hours straight. It then had to be parked for 8 consecutive hours to make sure the trainers were getting enough rest. But I would still average around 4000-4500 miles per week. Not the same as a full team, but all the money went into my pocket instead of splitting it with a team-mate.

 

My system was fairly easy. When I picked them up I would drive out of the city. Then I would find a large truckstop and have them drive around it to see how they shifted. Then we hit the open highway. I didn't do this for me but for them. I didn't want them too nervous and starting off in the city would have added to that.

For those who struggled with shifting I would actually put my hand over theirs and we would shift together. Uncomfortable? Yes, but they learned to shift quickly that way. Backing was without a doubt the hardest skill to teach. The main difference between a vet and a rookie is knowing when to give up. What I mean is, we all know that a proper back is all about the set up and each one of us screws the set up all the time. The difference is that us veterans know to give up and set it up again whereas a rookie will try the back. Of course an improperly set up back is very difficult and often impossible. Backing instruction took a LOT of time.

 

I think I would be good as a yard instructor or local trainer. I do love to teach but combining teaching with the OTR life was too much for me.

 

I've often said these very words to my wife. Too bad most of the driving schools pay next to nothing. It's really only suitable for a retired guy who's just looking for something to do with his time.

 

Trainers dont make enough. Letting some 21 year old kid put your life in his hands? No thanks! Lets not mention living with someone in an area smaller than a jail cell. F That

 

How much sleep do trainers get a day lol

 

No sleep for days.
That's what training was.
I trained at CRST for a summer.
No sleep for days.
It sucked.
First load was always SoCal to NY, or NJ. So there was almost no sleep for me until we got to the receiver.
Pay was .48/ mile for half the miles on the truck. Student starved, depending on what they were into when they got on the truck, some didn't really get any money until the second week.
They didn't give a dang about trainer / team / whatever, was basically dispatched as team from the jump.

About the middle of the second week you can get some sleep while student is driving, but you always have to give them lots of time to practice backing. And they only absorb so much, so fast, so after a few hours of backing student is exhausted, so then you sleep.

This was 2010 or '09. Maybe things have changed.
But none of the kids seem to have taken geography in school. None could use a map. All were butt hurt when the phone got locked into the glove box during their shift.

I noticed the students / new drivers coming in that smoke are much stronger players.

I understand CRE has a new policy that the student stays with the trainer for an unspecified amount of time. They are suppose to be in the mid 70's for company trainer pay.

CRST gave me a Cascadia with 10 miles on it. I remember thinking how I could make that truck literally last forever. How crisp it moved.
First student probably took 2 years off the life of the tranny, cranking the steering, etc.. Not sure how many years off my life.

 

What kind of training are you giving the student. ..laying in the bunk

 

As a trainer when Im told to stick so and so into the tractor and break him in and get the rust away, I get paid a little more so that the miles wont matter this week.
Now fast forward a bunch of years and when I trained Wife with FFE, they handed me a Book with 12 weeks of goals for her to learn and master. Then said I am paid about 1900 gross, 1550 net and in 12 weeks that salary goes bye bye and if she is hired on as my team we get paid so much per mile to the truck, both of us make the money together. I think I was .40 or so and wife was around .28 if that. Call it 60 plus cents to the truck at 6000 to 8000 miles per week.

Don't forget Perdeim figures to exempt about 14,000 dollars from your taxes that year we teamed up. You had to retain your logs togther for that year to prove audit for 8 years after you claim that perdiem.

We were introduced to McKesson in Memphis who handles Pharmacy narcotics and schedule one drugs to hospitals nation wide in values exceeding a million per load with about 5000 people tracking the trailer's satellite and door sensors etc and another 4000 tracking your tractor's condition over the satellite. If anything was out of ordinary you and your rig are already being hunted by police to do sham inspections to ensure you are ok and that no predators have gotten control.

Next time we go out, there will be a National Concealed Carry in force Nation wide and we will be packing appropirately ready to do battle. Not before. Never again.