Schneider is Awesome

Loss Prevention Tactical Manuring..... as in "we will throw BS againts the wall until something sticks, in an attempt to lessen our costs and preserve our profits"

This is the way of the business Jedi these days. Too bad.

 

A long time ago I was going to go to Schneider's driving school in WI (I'm from MI), but never did. Now I will be going to a local truck driving school; hopefully with a start date of next Monday. Are they a good starter company for a student? What kind of orientation period do they have for riding with a trainer?

 

i heard Schneider is good too

 

did you get asked to take a hair sample pre-employment drug screen for schneider

 

schneider?

 

In a safety sensitive job....hair sampling is becoming the norm...it PROVES you are clean for several weeks, even months...not just a week or so like the pizz test...which can also be beat.
Schneider is simply looking out for their own self interest....if you have a history of recent drug use...they don't want to put someone behind the wheel of a 80,000 lethal weapon...if they do, and an accident happens, the post accident drug tests will revel the drug usage, and the $$$ paid to the victims is HUGE!!
It is conceivable that it could put a company out of business....so the drug tests also ensures EVERYBODY who is working foir that company, and anybody else on the road, you DESERVE to be PROFESSIONAL DRIVER!!
If you want to do some funny stuff....like smoke some stuff...knock yourself out...just stay home, and work at the 7-11...opps...I think they do testing too....maybe there is an opening flipping burgers!!
Anytime you do a job in an industry where your actions could result in the death/dismemberment or injury of other innocents, you DO LOOSE SOME RIGHTS...POT may be SEMI legal in some locations...but that does not mean it does not effect your reactions...so it is like a DRUG that is not approved for use by drivers....

 

The REAL reason they use hair.....................

because it is so much harder to CHEAT !!!!!

 

then I went to work for them.
I signed on happily to run a dedicated account at decent but not great pay. Within a year they lost the contract and I was bumped to their 'one way' fleet (what they call OTR national).
During the two years I was there they had discontinued holiday pay, furloughed office staff, cancelled company participation in 401ks, not offered raises, and continue to be a 20th century trucking outfit paying household goods mileage instead of practical miles. Trucks I drove were all over 500,000 miles, maintenance on tractors was lousy (I got several tickets from roadside DOT inspections on items not within the driver's scope of daily inspections) and trailers worse (I had more blowouts with Schneider rubber in 2 years than in my previous 13 years of driving truck). Repairs to the a/c, the bunk heater, and the starter, would be delayed for months and they refused to do body work until one rig's annual DOT inspection came up and they HAD to replace the bunji cords holding up the front fairing from a previous driver overrunning a curb.
The broken A/C caused heat problems for me and my feet and a sweat rash turned to blisters when aggravated by company mandated and issued footwear. I fought thru it for 2 months before taking leave and submitting a workmans comp claim. The doctor approved it and Schneider then forced me to go to ANOTHER doctor who, surprise, denied the claim. I lost my years vacation pay because I had to cash it out to pay out of pocket expenses for a dermatologist. With no sleep apnea symptoms, I was told I had to have testing but 1) they would not pay me for my time 2) it had to be done on my time 3) they expected me to drive that day and again the next morning even thought as a company required medical test, it should have logged it on duty not driving.
That was the last straw - wait, no, the last straw was their announcement that they were not offering raises this summer - instead, you had to have gotten 2 bonuses in the past 3 quarters to qualify for your half cent. Bonuses are idling and overspeed (determined by their 60mph limit, not their 63 mph governors). Idling, of course, is just about impossible for a solo driver to cut back on enough and still maintain sleep comfort in the cab. So instead of telling us last winter that we had to earn those bonuses to get a raise, they wait until summer which ensures most of us won't get the raise at all for at least another 2 quarters (and no, 1/2 cent raise isn't enough incentive for me to sweat thru the summer nights).
So THAT was the last straw.
Al Schneider would be ashamed of what happened to his outfit and you can see how bad they have become when you realize I signed on 2 years ago when they closed their training facilities and began only hiring experience drivers at higher pay rates. Now? Schools open! CDL grads welcome! Pay is dropping. They publicize recruiting ads as much as CR England and if you dont understand that similarity, you need to do more research. Oh, before going to their one way fleet they offered me to go to their tanker division (they apparently WAY overextended themselves with tanker contracts in the last 2 years and are HURTING for tankers and teams). But, to go tanker, meant they expected me to lose my cpm salary and go to training for $350 a week for 2 weeks. Yeah, right, I'll take a $1200 pay cut for two weeks. NOT.
So I quit just short of 2 years and they stiffed me on my second years vacation pay saying that as a TN driver, they are not required to pay my pro-rated earned vacation pay.
Liars.
Cheats.
Thieves.
Welcome to Big Orange.

 

I worked for them from 2002 to 2006. I still have friends there and keep current with the goings on of my former home. They did me okay, home every other weekend and decent money but I swear if I had to read one more safety message about wearing my boots because some fatarse in flip flops went flying out of his truck onto his face, I would pull my hair out.

The bottom line, if your a safe driver because your livlihood and family depend on you then you don't need constant reminding about "three points of contact" and wearing your boots etc to remain safe. Schneider is the king at taking more from the driver and disguising like it's a good thing. The cheelrleaders will say "these cuts are necessary to ensure you have a job." No there not, many drivers quit and find themselves an additional $10,000 a year. Yea this economy is rough.

Great place to start but by staying longer than the required time to fullfill your part of the contract for the FREE training all your doing is holding yourself back. You can be home more and make more working for hundreds of other companies.

 

i just got hired on to schneider i graduated from trucking school dec 15 kinda excited start dec 31st