Stevens Transport aviary

Been out in the boonies this past week.. no internet.. got out of Cali on a load headed in to San Antonio.. got myself ahead of it and picked up a 34 hour reset before delivery. lucky me.

Now I'm cruising to New jersey on a 5 drop load out of Michaels in Austin. gonna be a long week

 

Not right wing ########. My beliefs. I have worked since I was 8 delivering newspapers every morning, 7 days a week. I remember before there was a minimum wage, and one accepted what they got paid.

I am also single.

Social programs with strict limits that provide temporary help to a person who is in dire straights due to no fault of their own, I do support. 99 weeks of unemployment insurance is too long. There are jobs, just may not be the same field one was once employed in. That is wasting my hard earned money, and creating people who will never go back to work.

Your question came across as you were asking about you, someone who is not even driving a truck for a living yet. If I ruffled your feathers that easily, I wonder how upset you will be when someone cuts you off in traffic, or criticizes you on the CB, or calls you names at a shipper for holding the line up. Just some things to think about.

Being a trucker, is not a job where someone holds your hand everyday. One must be proactive, and self reliant, or they will go broke, and be miserable away from home all the time.

 

I'm moving on and unless you have something constructive to say and can say it in a non argumentive way then please don't respond to my questions. I'm not here to debate politics or get into arguments with anyone. Or to be spoken down to or jerked around like wise. I'm here to get what I hope are honest answers to questions about trucking and to get a feel for what Stevens may be like as well as their drivers and student grads who are joining the company. Who knows? I might become one of them. It's quite clear that you and I have different views and let's just leave it at that. Keep yourself in good health and safe.

 

"I wonder how upset you will be when someone cuts you off in traffic, or criticizes you on the CB, or calls you names at a shipper for holding the line up. Just some things to think about.

Being a trucker, is not a job where someone holds your hand everyday. One must be proactive, and self reliant, or they will go broke, and be miserable away from home all the time."

Just to put your mind at rest TL , I can assure you that in my 30+ years of construction 10 of which I was a Foreman, I don't need anyone to hold my hand and I have strong leadership skills and also teaching skills and my people skills aren't too bad either. I'm a pretty easy guy to get along with and if we didn't have different social political views on things we'd probably get along just fine. But believe you me there are just as many jerks in construction as there are in any other industry. Trucking hasn't cornered the market them. Rest assured that I will be an excellent driver.

 

There are jerks in every walk of life, and some only feel good about themselves when they take their hatred out on someone else.

I play devils advocate to get people to think.. truck driving is not something many people can handle over a long period of time. Now if you keep your questions to trucking I will keep my answers to trucking. The SSDI question was NOT about trucking, but about a way to not work, and still get paid.

Just because you could boss people around on a construction site, proves nothing. There is no one to boss around on the road. I worked and trained in food service for 20 years. any of that apply to trucking? Yea, I won't train for Stevens or anyone else.

As for you being an excellent driver, only time will tell.

 

California the Boonies????

Be careful of taking a reset while you are under a load, violates company policy. Now setting and waiting to make a delivery for 34 hours sucks...

Have fun with that 5 dropper.

 

Log books, Stevens uses Both at this time. They are phasing in the electronic logs as time goes by, and the older Qualcomms quit working and need to be replace.

A repower is when I swap trailers with another driver. Sometimes both are loaded, and sometimes one is loaded and one is empty.

Repowers can be a blessing or a total screwing. All depends on the details. I have done repowers where I could not make my delivery, 500 miles away on time, and got to set for a day to make a 1 mile delivery. And I have done the opposite where I was early to my delivery, but they would not accept the load early, and took over a load with 100's of miles to go, while giving up the load that delivers the next day.

Produce loads because of delays at the shippers, are notorious for needed to be relayed (repowered). Most companies call it relaying the load, stevens calls it a repower as they put another power unit under the load to keep the load moving. Solo drivers coming out of california can get stuck in a loop of picking loads up, then not have the hours to make the delivery, so they give the load to a team, and go start picking up the next load. Rinse and repeat.

Some drivers love to do repowers, the constant changes, rarely bumbing a dock....Driving all night to save a load....

This driver does not like repowers. Many of them are caused by lack of planning and for thought. Stevens policy is put a truck under the load, we will repower it tomorrow. Makes the office staff look very busy. Constantly trying to get two trucks to the same location to make on time on both loads. Lots of work which with good planning could be avoided. But what do I know, I am only a truck driver.

It also allows Dispatchers, Driver Managers to cater to their favored drivers. To keep their pet drivers moving at the expense of other drivers. Dispatch tried it with me today. I have to manage my time very carefully on this load from cally to Denver. I am up against my 70 today and Sunday, with a 10am delivery on Monday. At first glance I can not make the load, and produce wanted me to give my load to a truck they had waiting for me in Reno with an empty. I had not sent in a running late message, or requested a repower.

My answer was no, I can make this load on time, legally and safely...I will just have to leave salt lake city at 11pm sunday night, a 9 hour drive for my 10 am appointment. Stevens prefers that you be setting within a few miles of your delivery the night before.

Hope that long winded answer helps.

 

Speaking of repowers.
Got out of Laredo with a load of broccoli bound for Albany Oregon. Figured I'd get there,then take a day off up in Portland and see some friends, family.
Somewhere in the backroads of Hwy 83 came a call.
Repower?
Load for National City, CA....
Holy smoke, was I on that one!
Been trying to get back to San Diego for 5 weeks. There's a crown sitting at my dentist office there with my name on it andI'm tired of sucking wind over this poor tooth!
So I'll do that, then take a day off and visit friends there.
While swapping trailer today, found they had it in the 6th hole. Weighed it out, over on the tandems. Moved the 5th wheel, layed hands on it and prayed...but still couldn't get it to work.
I wanted this load, so we restacked the load (it was all 50# boxes of shortening). Ended up having to move 1200# from the tail, to the middle, but finally got the tandems down to 33,860.
Like I said, I've been trying to get back down to San Diego for 5 weeks, but every load I've been promised had something happen.
So now I have this one and I'm not answering my phone until after I get there tomorrow night.
They're not getting this one away from me!

 

I'm hoping to be accepted to the school in TX. I should know on Monday. Hopefully be in the class starting the 18th.

This conversation on here has been very very informative.

My question is for those of you that went through Stevens Acadamy to get your CDL ... Of the students that did not make it to get their CDL, what were the some of the reasons they didnt make it?