Pushy Dispatcher threatens to fine me $600 is it legal?

Ide plaster there name all over the place I mean what are they gonna do fire me. I'm shaking in my boots lmao

 

If fining the driver is illegal then signing a contract cannot make it legal to fine him. You cannot enforce a contract that requires illegal activity. However the OP may not know that and may not be prepared to file a lawsuit.

 

My post was before he came back and said he wasn’t 1099.

 

I used to drive for a company like that, stay out three or four weeks and come home for time off and on the second day off my phone is blowing up, we've got this load that HAS to go! The first few times (yes they did it every time I came home for time off) I left early and went out, and then I finally figured out that was their deal to do that every #### time I came home. When I answered the phone, I would say you really really need me to leave now, it's that important? Yes it is! Then if it's that important then I need a raise right now or the trucks not moving! Click..... Hello? They finally got the message.....

 

I had issues with my dispatcher so I documented them in an email to my terminal manager (his boss). I was assigned to a different dispatcher and all was well. Funny thing, a couple of years later that dispatcher left the company and I ended up back with the first one, and we mostly get along fine now.

The point is, that jerk has a boss, who probably wants to keep a decent driver and who also probably doesn’t know this guy is hassling you when you’re trying to sleep…

 

I strongly suspected he was 1099 also.

 

Was working on a wind farm in MilfordUT. Rigging crew pulls up with a crane to unload me. This woman pulls up, new pickup, new hard hard, new PPE, slams the door walks up and starts cursing at me. I shake my head NO and walk off to the other side of the trailer and start removing the securement. She seemed puzzled for a moment but comes around louder. I walked away. That stunned her for a moment and so she follows and starts screaming and turning colours, veins popping out of her forehead and neck. The rigging crew are rolling with laughter.

“DRIVER! WHY WONT YOU STAND STILL AND TALK TO ME???”

I stop. I pause. I turn around and walk up to her, get really close to her face (and I am an ugly guy) and I whisper…
‘because you are yelling at me and I have sensitive ears.’

“Oh,” she said softly.

I smile, “Now, we can talk. What seems to be the problem?” It was a small issue with the shipper, but her way of handling things was to try to intimidate. That doesn’t work. I don’t intimidate. There will be no yelling, no disrespect, no manipulation, no comparisons with other drivers…whatever. Otherwise, there will be NO communication. I’m the guy that can get it done, problem solver, and never drop the ball, HOWEVER…

1. You are going to pay me.
2. You will mind how you talk to me. We are not going to yell at each other.

Common mistakes that new drivers make:

1. They are Nice. Nice guys want you to like them. They don’t want to rock the boat. So, when the AC quits working, they will suffer through the heat and sit in a stifling truck smelling their nuts bake. Or when they schedule home time, they get cheated out. And they complain to anyone who will listen.

DONT BE NICE. You live up to your end of the deal, demand they keep theirs. Prepare to walk if they don’t. Nothing personal, it’s just business.

2. Too sensitive. Are you still holding a grudge about last month? Let me tell you something about dispatchers…they sit at a desk all day coddling drivers. They put their time in, and forget about all of you when they clock out and go home. This is also why you don’t do favors, because as soon as you agree to do it, they have forgotten about it.

So you are sitting in your truck pouting about something that happened 4 months ago. Your dispatcher doesn’t care.

“I’m mad at you.”

‘Okay. Go pick this load up.’

“But I am a person, not a number. I feel as though you don’t respect me and value me as a person.”

(Uhoh. They covered this during dispatcher orientation. There’s a chapter about this in the Dispatching Dummies book by JJ Keller, chapter 5, “What to Do When Driver Starts Puking Feelings.”

Step 1. Put him on speaker and call everyone around you and prepare to laugh.
Step 2. Play the song “Feelings” softly in the background.)

 

Is this dispatcher the safety officer if not share texts with him or her .. I’d bet dispatcher attitude changes if not find another job.

 

This. Fire that #### dispatcher. It is in your abilities to do so as a driver... not to fire them from the company, but to bar them from ever attempting to dispatch you, personally