Payment for Damage ?

actually your wrong, I've worked in resturants and seen wait staff fired for breaking stuff, if it happens too often, your gone. One of my good friends is the head mechanic for a local PD, they fired an officer last summer who had wrecked three cruisers in 6 yrs, only one was in the line of duty (a chase), the other two were negligence/carelessness. One of my nephews was a cop with a local PD, he backed into a civilians car last spring, $2,500 in damage to the civilians car, he wasn't paying attention. He was suspended by the Dept. for 5 days without pay for careless driving. One way or another, they will get you.

 

The bad news is that the "who" part is usually them and the "what" is according to their policies....most likely written and unwritten.
Your concern and hesitation should be a red flag for you.

 

Thanks. I was thinking the same thing, it is good to hear feed back
from a fellow driver.
Some of the other things that raised a concern for me. Older trucks and they seem to always be hiring.
I need a job but.... I think Ill pass.

 

Older trucks is not necessarily a problem. But the "always hiring" would be the red flag for me. Particularly in today's economy.

 

Well normally old truck arent a big deal for me either. Like most of us I spent a large part of my career driving f.o.r.d. (fix or repair daily) trucks.
What also made me uneasy was the fact are they gonna try to stick me with
equipment failure?

 

Good point.

I paid all damages to the equipment caused by drivers. Not did it only cost me thousands it also took up most of my time.

After I told the drivers that they will pay for damages there was almost no more accidents.

Some drivers just don't care, hit them where it counts and they start to care a lot.

 

That's because some small companies such as mine have to pay $5,000 deductable for each incident. I had a driver that crushed an air deflector behind the cab because he told me the load had to be delivered.
Driver pay was $450, my profit was $225 air deflector $600.

The same driver damaged a brand new 24.5 Alcoa rim my cost $500. His excuse was " it was a tight turn". I told him then why do it? Call dispatch and explain to them that you cant deliver because you might damage the truck. The customer can figure out how to get their product out. For a load that I made $150 he damaged a $500 rim.

I bought a used 53' reefer not a single scratch or dent on it. After 4 months it had:

3 broken ribs.
4 panels needed to be replaced.
1 reefer door.
1 trailer door had to be re-done.
1 rim changed, curb rash
1 rear bumper re finished.

Total bill $8,500 that I paid out of my pocket.

Not to mention all of the other dings and scratches.

However I had a driver that hit a deer and damage to the truck was extensive, the damages did not exceed $4,000. Since it was not the drivers fault I paid for the repairs and did not go through insurance.