greatwide ripoff!

Are you saying that people at the TOC or GSC or whatever they are own trucks that haul for GW?

 

Whatever the office staff goes through,is only from 9 to 5,five days a week.They get paid the same every week,if they do a good job or not.They go home and sleep in their own bed every night.No,we have no idea how that is

 

Let me say i have been a O/O for 26 years i can tell you now, if you dont know the system you will get screwed!!! I see it more in the south than any where else. You need to know the law!!! Do research on the company before you lease. Get yourself a copy of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. This is more than a safety book, it covers leasing laws. My book shows section 376 for leasing. Get the regulations for The DEPT OF Labor. I f your company is telling you what loads to take they are violating the law, you then become an employee. Check the IRS laws also. Check your contract for items you agreed to pay. These companys cant break the contract by adding more charges to you unless you agree to it.

 

Wow things sure are bad in the O/O world. I use to pull a lot of port freight for Wal-Mart, in 1999 when fuel was 99cent i was making $1.00 pm plus drop and hooks and detention. and sometimes i got paid to unload the trailer. I would not dare buy a truck today!!!

 

Be careful about City miles or Household Movers miles. You can lose 200 miles a day if you get paid by these type of miles. Flat tire fees and other fees are all ripoffs. If you can buy your own tags and insurance, DO IT !! you can get better insurance rates yourself. Buy a private accident policy that covers you 24 hrs a day. You can buy a cheap policy to cover loss wages in the event you get hurt on the job. DONT BUY WORKERS COMP!! you will get ripped off. The company may tell you to have workers comp but you can buy another type of accident policy that is better. workers comp is based on the more you make the more you pay.

 

Like you said know the laws read the contract.. In most states Workmans Comp is required now days.. It sucks. ours is a flat 28ish a week.. think 27.40 or something..

But for bigfatslims complaints. They don't tell you where to go they offer you up to 5 loads (so they can say its not force dispatch). All 5 may be going to the exact same place.. But you still had a choice of 5 loads.. If you don't pick a load from said 5 loads they will then move your pta up 24 hours after the first time.. Then 2 days later (if your lucky) you will get another shot at dispatch.. They will once again offer you up to 5 loads (probably some variant or the 5 you turned down 2 days ago) if you don't pick from them they will again move your pta 24 hours out.. So another 2 days setting at home. I see the bigfats of the world every week roll in the terminal tell us what we are doing wrong we all laugh.. We know they will be gone in a month or 3 .. But they tell us how we should do this how they are going to do that.. They ask if they can make 3k a week here.. We all say no.. They get mad and tell us we don't know what we are talking about.. We laugh.. A month later they are quitting and apologizing.. We just laugh and tell them if they would have listened, they might have made it.. I told bigfat it was going to be tough starting out when he did.. Got to get tags for 2010 and they start holding out for 2011 in October, and like any company they get theirs before you get yours. I wish bigfat luck.. He just wasn't o/o material. its really as simple as that.. He didnt seem to get the finer points of deductions.. and how there are a #### ton of them when you first get started. The first 3 months I owned a truck I lived in it .. But I also got ahead 2 payments in that time, but I understood the business.

Everyone that wants to be an o/o ask yourself this.. Do I have 10% of 60,000 in the bank. Can I manage my checkbook as a company driver? Do I know where the starter, transmission turbo are at on this truck? Can I save myself money by doing simple maintinece on my tractor ie tires starters turbos, radiators wheel seals and rebuilding 5th wheels? Am I willing to do all of the above? Do I know how to manage my fuel taxes (yes even if your company keeps track you need to know when and where to buy fuel) every penny counts in this business.. Are you smart enough to listen and not open your mouth when you don't know as much as that 40 year 8 million miler of an o/0? Can you stay out of the truck stops? Can you stay out of the casinos? Can you stay away from fancy cars wild women and booze? Are you willing to work 70 hours a week 7 days a week every week? (I know that is not possible with the log book but you don't log everything even with paperless). Are you willing to read a freaking contract before you sign it?

If you answered no to any of those pack your bags and go back to swift or werner. There is nothing wrong with them you just need to be told be here at 5 am and and be 500 miles down the road by 5 pm. With that structure comes less freedom but less financial responsibility.

Greatwide is extremely self absorbed but everything bigfat is complaining about is in the contract that he signed. He read the forums asked about greatwide we warned him and several others some listened others don't .. He just can't get it through his head he only has himself to blame.. My dad use to tell me (he was a o/0 forever) "I see guys go buy a new truck every day, hell they even buy good used trucks.. and they tell me they are going to do this and that.. Then 5 months later they come to me and say how do you make it work.." He would very simply say " I don't have a choice" In other words.. He signed that note at the bank or the dealership.. He was going to honor that note no matter what.. I have seen him not eat anything except canned soup or meat for a month because he had stuff fall apart on him and he had to HONOR that COMMITMENT he had made and get that note caught up he said it would have been easier to walkaway but it wasn't the proper thing to do... PEOPLE JUST WALK AWAY FROM THERE SACRED HONOR TO EASILY. If your word isn't worth signing don't do it.. But I have no respect for someone that isn't intelligent enough to read a contract for either a truck they are going to buy or a place they are going to lease on to.. and then to let the truck go back because it was hard.. Jesus its hard no matter what you do.. Its never impossible..

 

That's not true, maybe for some office staff but it wasn't for me and it isn't for a lot of people. There were weeks when I was in the office from Monday at 6 am until Tuesday afternoon trying to finish billing. I worked tons of overtime without clocking it, worked nights, weekends, holidays, never took a vacation in four years (tried but was denied everytime I requested). I take that back, to took off a week about three months after I first started working there for my wedding. I was moved to dallas for a year but my husband couldn't go so I lived in dallas during the weeks (not my own bed) and home on weekends. I also worked in other terminals out of town when they sent me. When I was "off" I worked from home. There were people at corp who work around the clock. I could email them at noon on Wednesday or 3 am on Sunday and they would get back to me because they were working all the time. Just because you don't see us in the office doesn't mean we aren't somewhere working.

 

I wish everyone at GW had this additude. If all o/o's had this same work ethic and took responsibility and all office staff had integrity and believed in honesty and teamwork what a different place this world would be.

 

Yeah, I've got a friend who was leased to Dallas Mavis for a long time and really did well there. He really liked them. It took GreatWide about 6 weeks to run him off. He had been there a long time and is an asset to anything he's associated with. What a shame to chase off folks with his experience and expertise.

It's today's corporate world, though. I'm leased to a once great company that's on it's way downhill, "like a snowball headed for hell" (to quote an icon), after we were bought by FedEx, another group of soulless corporate robots. I know how he felt leaving, and how those who liked being associated with Dallas Mavis felt watching their carrier swallow its' #####.

 

On the flat/stepdeck side there is an agent/broker in Tx.that owns trucks,he only loads his own.He has a yard by the military freight in Sealy.He sends his local trucks in there ,gets a lot of loads,drops them in his yard to be hauled by his over the road trucks.There is an agent in Jacksonville Fl. with his own trucks,same set up with the yard.Rarely will he load other trucks.If they do they charge you for loading your truck.