Marten Driver (currently)

Which, after you get your lunch money, probably translates into something like .20 or less towards some important income numbers like what your vacation pay is determined from, or what a bank looks at when you apply for a loan.

You might want to consider going to another company if you want to avoid being showered on and told it's sunny.

 

what about saia

 

I don't know about SAIA but it's a big enough company that other drivers who do must have expressed their opinions on this forum. Just type "SAIA" into the search box or check if they are listed in the "Trucking Company DAC Reports" section.

 

We have been with Marten Transport for 2 months now and we love it. Now don't get my wrong my husband is the driver and im the wife who doesnt drive but I deal with all the payroll and benefits and well all the policy items. My hubby has 30 years of OTR driving under his belt and has been with many different companies. He is a driver through and through. He likes to run and run hard. Dont sit him or he is done. Like every human being he likes to be treated with respect. Out of all the companies my husband has been with he had the opinion that he will only get treated well by May trucking out of OR which he had been with for several years. When we got together he came off the road for some crazy idea that he was done with trucking and wanted to stay home. I dont really know what he was thinking except that he fell in love with me and my son. After 2 years of lying to himself he did go back. But he jumped without looking things over. Went to J.B. Hunt and sat for most of the month he was with them. I was able to calm him down and i got his resume out and started researching companies. Marten Transport gave him a call. Tina is the recruiter we worked with and she is completely straight forward doesn't sugar coat it. That was the first thing we really liked. there was no we'll do this and that and then it never happens. Every question we asked was answered with a straight forward answer. No hope crushing here. They bused my husband from San Antonio TX to Irving TX. Oreintation was for 3 days. During Orientation my husband was offered a regional position instead of OTR. I was very worried about him making that move because he didnt get the miles running regional with J.B. Hunt like they said he would. But we agreed for 1 month to try it out. We have loved them ever since. Now heres the skinny of it all. Yes they are on a sliding pay scale but its not that confusing. say you are on the .37 cent scale. ok that means you will make no less then .37 cpm. if you deliver a load within 150 miles of pick up and its not going to a yard (from shipper to reciever only) loads they pay 20% of the revenue. They do Per Diem pay as well and it is not optional for company drivers but you come out ahead every week. Now by federal regulations they can only do it for so much so about one week every 2 months your whole payroll is tax-deductible. Which that in its self helps you out as well come taxs time. They have late model KW, Petes, and Freightliners. All trucks have chains but are not used. All trucks are equiped with APUs. All trucks have talking qualcomms. Most trucks carry on board scanners for all paperwork. If by chance you dont get a truck with a new qualcomm system in it they will eventually get you to Mondovi for the new system. Breakdown and repair is ever easy to get intouch with and any time my hubby has had something go wrong they if not immediately got it fixed it was done within a few days. In fact my husband got a call this morning they had told him this qualcomm wasnt working and he didnt even know it. Everything looked in good ordered. They turned him around to Houston and immediately fixed the fuse that went out. 80% Fleet is on electronic logs that are very eay to use right there on the qualcomm they are working on getting the whole fleet that way. OK so tolls and wash outs and reimbursements. All tolls and washouts they want you to get a PO for it from your FM. it only takes a moment and they get it back to you in just a few minutes not that big of a deal. you then scan your reciept and they give the total of the reciepts back to you that same week if you scanned it all in by Tuesdays at 3 pm CST. If you are dispatched on a load and fuel you are able to get an advance when you fuel as well. The amount of the advance depends on the length of the load. We have never had force dispatching my hubby had to turn down a few loads either because of his time or trying to get me home or whatever reason his FM said taking loads are up to him. Next, Mon-Fri during the day we have never had a problem getting ahold of our FM. Night and weekend is a different story but just keep calling the numbers they give you and you will get through to someone. if for some reason they didnt solve the issue your FM will be on it first thing in the morning and things are dealt with correctly. There is an open door policy so always remember to get names and their info so if their is a problem it can be dealt with and save everyone from a headache. Marten Transport does take alot of pride in their equipment and they take care of their good drivers. THey have a very high standard they want their drivers to meet in every aspect of who they are and what they do. All in all my hubby is always moving never sitting. The pay is good and the benefits are greats. Our family is fully medically covered. I recieved a letter in the mail just the other weeks stating that for the 10th years i believe in a row they have frozen their heallthcare pricing so the pricing will not increase for 2011 it will stay the same as now and for the whole famliy with medical denal vision life disability and critical illness we are paying 125 per pay period which is cheap compaired to most places. Overall we are very very happy with Marten Transport and my husband doesnt want to work for another company he is treated with respect and is running the way he like to run.

 

I am Very Happy For your husband. I only wish my experience was similar. Just imagine the exact opposite. That is what i have seen so far.

 

Oh boy, a cheer leader.
First off i have been been here as of yesterday 5 years.
It's not the same company it was 3 years ago.
Marten has put 85%- 90% of thier otr frieght on the rail. OTR Drivers are losing out. Tim ' i hate truck drivers' Kohl the current Pres of Marten is turning Marten into a regioanl company. So When a otr driver leaves either coast, and ends up on the other side of the country, they are stuck doing those reginoal runs, till it';s time to go home to the the other coast.

Yes there is forced dispatch. (are u a o/o)Even the recruiters tell you this. The only way you can refuse a load, is your out of hrs, out of service, or you are sick and or to tired to drive. Even then dispatch will tell you you gotta run it or you will be written up. Then your next 2-5 loads, you will be runnin even shorter loads, oe end up sitting multipal weekends

Per deim. Every single tax expert you hear on thses trucking shows, have said it's a bad thing. The oonly people making money is the company, seeing how they now don't have to pay all your pay roll taxes. At the end of the year, if those taxes aren't satisfied, you the driver has to pay them.

Open Door Policy. Ya right.
I just was put on with a differant dispatcher. For the last 6 months i have been figthing with managemnt to get me a differant one, because i was sick and tired of not getting home on time or with in a reasonable amount of time. I was told i was sabtoging my hrs, there fore never had the hours to get home on time. Someone explain to me how one sabatoges thier hos on Elogs? I use the amount required to run a load and no more
So when i wen to the 'team lead' and his boses for the 6 months, it was a on going fight. It took a threat of going to the nearest terminal and cleaning out the truck.

Road Serv and service.
Oh please. Every time i call road service i and many others have been stuck in limbo on hold for up to 60 mins. Then the answer they tell you only takes 10 seconds. Oh we can't get it fixed on the road, you have to have it done at a terminal. Flat tires.,, If you don't have a spare, for the trailer, they make you sit at tk stop untill they can find another truck with a spare tire, and then they re route that truck to your location so he can give you that spare. Thus when he needs one, the same thing happens.(i have been called at the house in the middle of the night 50 miles from Reno, and they want me to take my spare there) I tell them, Im on home time, and if they want it, that truck must come get it after 7am local. They say never mind.
Trying to get a shop appoinment is a joke. You snd in your reqest for service, and at Indy,Chester,Ontario,Irving, Mondovi It could be up to 4-5 days after the day of your appoinment, that they may get you in. Even if your passing thru for a mudflap or burned out marker light they tell you it may be a couple of days. This was the case 2 days ago to another driver i know.

Insurance is exspensive. I have a friend with another carrier and has almost the same coverege as i do and he is paying cheaper weekly rates.
True this year for the 2ND year in a row they are not raising the monthly cost.

Vetern drivers with the company are treated like shi*. Since day one of the Western Regioanl starting up , i have been trying to get onto it.
When i call Wilsonville, where they are based out of, oh we don't need any.
Yet, i arrived in Ontario on this past Thursday am, the last day day of oreintation here. 15 new hires, 9 of them going to western region.
Each week i hear those co. drivers who have been here 20-25 years are leaving, because they are sitting more often, miles are dropping. Even those on a famous candy company dedicated are seeing there west coast loads going to Wisconson, to that company's dist, are losing loads to rail. I have friends on the Chicago rail team, and they are del those loads 3-4 times a week.

Tolls, we are required to follow the EZ PASS toll listing the co. prints out. Washouts, are only paid back, if it's stated on the load info , washout approved.
Scale tickets, if the load doesn't weight at least 42,000 the co. will not pay them back. Now there are ways around that. If the air scale on the trailer is broke or out of calibration, then you report this, and tell them , hey i need to scale out, to ensure my tanedm weight is good. And at least with me , they will accept that.
Wating for your dispatcher to send that po. can take hours. Weekend . after hrs will not give you po's, talk to your dispatcher is thier response.

Yes you have only been here 2 months, give it 9 months, and then come back here, and discuss how you feel.

High standerds of drivers?. I watched a truck leave Ontraio yesterday, he pulls out the gate, not cutting the right turn wide enough, his loaded trailer jumped the curb, rolled over the grass, and SLAMMED BACK DOWN ON THE STREET. The trailer, had he been going any faster could of laid over blocking the entire street.
Trucks rolling thru the yrds, at 2000 rpm's in 2nd gear, for no reason. Yrd limits 5 mph, with 4 way flashers on.

 

Right now you're in think positive mode, all gung ho about driving for Marten. Best way to approach any new job if you ask me. I do the same.

All of that aside, Marten does have a long history of being among the top companies to drive for, especially for drivers like your husband and myself who like to run. I totally agree with much of your lengthy post, especially everything you said about their equipment, including on-board devices and APUs.

But please don't take your company's word for it that per diem is a good thing that helps drivers. The story they provided you with was carefully designed to mislead you into believing something that isn't true. Unless you simply don't want to know what's actually going on, I suggest looking deeper into the subject than merely how it affects your weekly paycheck.

Here's a link to an informative article published in the July 2010 issue of LandLine Magazine:

http://www.landlinemag.com/Archives/2010/July10/Bottom_Line/perplexed.htm

 

LOL wish I'd have seen that! What makes it all the funnier is the fact that Francis Street is so wide - all the room in the world to swing way out for that turn!

 

Seems like every time i come off of hometime in ontario, they send me to tolleson ,az with 2 days to get there(350 miles). im otr and have been here a little over two years. A year ago I would come off of hometime and would get a load to chicago, or maybe murfreesboro,tn. This week I sat almost 3 days, but not enough for layover , or even a restart. Im going to see how my friend does on the western regional fleet. He just started with marten a week ago. If he is doing good, and he gets some decent hometime, I might see if I can get on that fleet. :smt017

 

I got a question......Does the fleet manager have any Influence on the loads we are given? Or is it all up to the load planner? I always here that a driver should be cool to their fleet manager so they will get good loads, but if the load planner assigns the load, what good does it do to try to get on the good side of the FM? :smt102