Getting safety points for people "calling in on you"

Keep out of the ditches, and give it a year at least. Then start application elsewhere.

 

I estimate at least half the trailers at Swift have that phone number mysteriously spray painted solid black. A can of black paint seems to find its way into the side box for some reason.

 

One of our competitors got the bright idea to put their company logo and their phone number on their mud flaps.
That brilliant idea lasted about two weeks. The owner said that he was getting ten times the number of nuisance damage calls.
I offered to buy all the mudflaps from him and put them on our trucks. He didn't think that was funny at all. I thought it was a great idea.

 

Every once in a while the Driver Leader (lol, new term for driver manager) at Swift will call their drivers to go over the driver's "Dashboard". Basically it is the computer record/score of the driver both good and bad. All sorts of things play into how this score is calc'd.

Things that help your score are like logging into Swift University and taking a bunch of courses and passing the open book quiz at the end of each course lol.

Being On Time for your loads.

Public calling in with good reports of your driving or attitude at customers.

Well they called me one day and said I was on the edge of being fired because my score was too high or too low or whatever the threshold was. The big thing was a call in from some lady in Kentucky who said I ran her into the ditch on a certain day and time. I checked my logs and had proof my truck and person were in Washington state that day. I got transferred to Safety upstairs who confirmed my location date/time and he in turn got me the number to the Swift Mothership down in Phoenix to straighten all this out. The lady down in PHX refused to remove the offending in house violation against me. She stated she was just too busy. She asked me rhetorically if I knew how many calls her office gets on the daily for Swift drivers ####ing up lol. There was just no way she would have time to remove one bad ding against a driver plus being a Swift driver chances are pretty good I must have screwed up somewhere that wasn't reported so it's a fair system.

 

@scottied67 ...wow, just wow...

 

Please tell us you were doing a buttonhook right turn and ran the lady into the median ditch...

...just sayin'...

 

Could be worse, I ran a lawyer off into the grass on 83 north once. I needed her space and took it otherwise we would have had a ginormious wreck. That company no longer exists so I don't worry about a suit grinding a axe with my rig on it.

 

I had a fun one once, long enough ago that any statute of limitations there might be have long since run out so I guess it's safe to share here.

I was pulling a log wagon that I'm pretty sure wasn't really all on the up & up (inspection a couple weeks earlier got written up for not having the trailer registration paperwork, and the plates were coming up "no record on file" in the computer...and I was in the state the plate on the trailer was from). Anyway, I'm a couple states away on a 4-lane divided state highway and needed to change lanes to the left, so I put my signal on and watch for a break in traffic. Idiot in the pickup behind me must've thought that blinky light meant "please pass on this side", because he jumped out there to pass in the gap I was waiting for. Well, he got up about even with the trailer tandems before my tractor was occupying the lane...straddling the zipper waiting for him to back off before completing the lane change. He was now straddling the yellow line and paused for a split second before mashing the gas again to attempt the pass. I moved over the rest of the way into the left lane, causing him to wind up in the grass median fishtailing and trying not to lose it. He jumps back in behind me, and I see him scribbling down my license plate. Yeah, buddy, good luck with that. Next time a truck puts its blinker on, don't jump out from behind it to attempt a pass on the side that blinker is flashing. If you didn't want to be behind me, all you had to do is keep your sorry ### in the right lane.

I never heard anything from that. No company info on the trailer, and the plates wouldn't have been much use if they called the law...no record on file. Used to be fun out here...

 

I can get you a job today in the Dallas area. Home daily, guaranteed pay, weekend and holidays off, benefits, 401k etc.

They hired me with less experience and a #### load more safety points at Swift. Terminal manager is former Swift safety and has seen all their ########. He will be sympathetic for sure.

If you're interested hit me up and I'll pass you the info.

 

4 points is nothing. You don't need a year of experience, just 3 months. 3 months shows you're a dedicated and loyal professional in this industry. Enjoy it while it lasts. Apply on Friday, be in orientation on Monday. Go somewhere with idle-free air, apu's and inverters. It makes life on thr road much easier. Most companies include Dallas as part of the East, east of I-35.