Plan 1 or plan 2??

So if a company tells you to go get a load you are going to say no? Not a good plan.

 

I think he means a good company won't do that to you, at least not often.

 

I understand your position completely.

I'll use myself as a example. You hand me a Yakima load of Onions to Boston Chelsea Market due in 6 days time solo during a winter storm that's blasting the Dakotas and another coming into Seattle.

I am a warrior and that load is there in 5 some days. Almost the 6th despite the problems that came up on that one run as a example. YOU as my boss will see the computer printout that load is marching across the USA in the dead of winter along with several very valid repair problems that week to my truck. You will see that my log hours are adequate, legal and so forth. You check my miles left every morning against the 6th day appointment time. No doubt Boston is calling you daily how are "MY ONIONS" doing? today. Where are they at now?

if.... if...

you found that you had a lazy sad sack intent on doing nothing and was not out of Montana on Day 4 and running horribly late while being buried in incresingly pleading calls from Boston, OMG PLEASE get MY ONIONS here 6th day, you CANNOT imagine my customers being out of Onions this weekend, You have GOT to be in Boston as agreed. Im paying you etc. And as time goes by you hear anger prior to potentailly being fired as a Trucking Company because Mr Lazy driver did not roll like he should.

Fire Mr Lazy. I can still stand by my opinion you will find 50 more Warriors at your door ready to take former Lazy's tractor.

You follow me? Mr Lazy would be so obvious on a trip like I described here. It will also reveal itself in a number of other ways very quickly like within two months at most. Remember I put up the idea that if they incur a service failure, they have to be investigated and if found to be lazy, fire em.

Trucking companys by and large by now would be very #### good at sniffing out a rotten lazy driver by now don't you think?

 

Sounds like BS to me. I doubt they can delver.
Dispatchers live in a world of theoretical possibility's. It maybe possible to make that run, if you don't have any delays, or need to stop for fuel, you "could" be there just in time to deliver just before they close. They Might stay late to unload you, or turn you away because they know better. All that running just to sit overnight anyway.

I would give it a go anyway, probably salary, so I could play it safe and have consistent pay, even though I have money in the bank already.

That being said, lots of drivers are just plain lazy. You could probably opt out of the salary position and still do better without pushing it to the extreme. Somewhere in between.

 

If a tractor went down for two weeks that's horrible.

I usually let that go once with any company PROVIDED they fix the #### thing proper. Or as one did assign me a virgin tractor ready to work a few years before wear and tear got into it.

It has been my experience that world class trucking companies big and small with the very best equipment that rarely breaks down is among the hardest ever companies to join up. Simply because no one quits or is fired etc.

I remember visiting Frock Brothers which was a full Reefer Outfit near Hanover for years when they featured KW's with Studio and other really wonderful equipment, pay etc. They were polite and turned down my application which I turned in regularly. I believe they are actually still in business and if I was not medically disqualified, I probably would have turned in yet another application late in life.

Now... if I ran for a crappy company that could not be bothered to fix their trucks or have good equiptment. B&B Concrete in Little Rock Comes to mind. They give me a 9800 International Paystar from something like the early 70's possibly (I will have to google it... it's one of the worst trucks I have ever, ever touched... the floor pan fell through the frame at 70 mph from the entire cab once...)

My trainer actually QUIT 4 weeks prior to that floor incident, he was rolling at that time a mid 90's Pete short nose 379 daycab with AIRRIDE and a number of other wonderful things. The last request of that trainer was to tell the Manager to hand that Pete to me and let me run like always. But in much better health than being beaten up by that crappy Paystar tractor. (Remember I was routinely loaded to 120K at times in flyash when not running cement.)

I think my pay was 8.20 a hour. Working 60 hours a week. That came out to 300 net. 400 to 650 miles a day. And this is strictly between Little Rock - Hope Arkansas and Little Rock - Redfield I was actually #### near running OTR miles for #### pay.

No wonder I quit.

If HE could be bothered to have decent equipment near brand new with airride and so on able to do the work and paid twice what he paid, I would have been staying with him.

But no. As a employee doing my best in very difficult situations my attitude became increasingly disgruntled. It takes a awful awful awful lot to make me angry, then disgruntled. Then finally hostile. Boss recognized that we have tension and made threats to my face one morning at 6 am work time because I dared to be working with spouse and two cars so that she could be at the VA ON TIME as a very particular worker which is absolutely VITAL in that hospital. I was supposed to leave at 4 am to be in Hope but I left at 6 instead.

but no after that spoken threat, i quit right then and there and went home. Enough was enough. 300 a week. 3000 miles run a week. BS.

That one experience with that employer would set some thinking pernamently in stone to any potential employer. I'll run for you short of war. But I refuse to be abused or given #### equiptment that wont not break down. Or both.

 

That is the other reason I advocate a salary. I don't care what time a dispatcher has me at a customer. if they closed the doors and went home as i pulled up to the gaurd shack? Oh well. Im on time. They went home. Time for 10 hour break. Try again tomorrow.

You as a company owner, see a dispatcher do things like that? You two will have a converstation today. Depending on that converstation you may or may not have to find a replacement dispatcher OR... improve that dispatcher to where I pull up the street at 9 am when they open for workday on time and ready to unload me after their morning coffee and safety briefing, company whoo whoo cheer or whatever else they do in the am.

One time I had a load from Bear Island near Doswell VA to Dow Jones Printing in West Des Moines IOWA as a solo. I ran my wheels off with that rolled paper news print load against the truck governor of 67 all the way there.

while still 20 miles before Des Moines it's 1 PM my appointment time. Keep in mind Bear Island rolled my paper into our trailer within 20 minutes, bills signed and gone in the night prior. Logbooks would just have to catch up.

At 1PM you are calling me saying Im late. Dow Jones need that newsprint for printing tomorrows paper tonight. Im 18 miles and closing. Can Dow Jones stay open a #### 30 minutes I need to get to their dock?

They did. Because they had no choice. Imagine the embarrassment if there was no wall street journal or some important paper the next day because little old me and my load of paper is told to wait until tomorrow AM because I was 20 minutes late after a complete and total logbook busting overnight run.

This industry has to stop doing BS things. Not just the dispatcher in the trucking company but also Shippers and Recievers.

Those changes will take place long after I am dead and gone, if ever. Everything probably will be amazon style by then. I don't know.

This industry requires a certain amount of time with a governed truck casterated to 62 mph to get something delivered. It WILL NOT BE THERE ANY EARLIER even if you had a team inside that stupid truck. 1500 mile solo overnights to be at des moines at 1PM is cutting it very very very close not to mention breaking a stack of federal rules.

And you want to fire ME for going a extra mile for YOu at the risk of my CDL? HA.

Next time I'll park her somewhere in Ohio and take my 10. Dow Jones will just have to do without tomorrows newspaper.

 

I would just have a problem if I got paid the same if I ran 5,000 miles or 10,000 in a month, I don't see swift or some of them paying any better by salary and they will really run you maximum miles because it will actually make them even more money. Being paid by the mile is the best way I can see to be paid for a driving job.

 

That's funny. I drove for a place like that with 62mph trucks. they claimed the loads were based on a 55mph average. But it took 20-40 minutes from the decision that I could do the load until the time I received the dispatch. And I always had to argue and explain it to someone, in vain, the error of their ways.