Star

Star's routes are up in the N/E. Hope you like joisey.. You will see a lot of it.

 

I don't want to sound negative or burst your bubble, however 7-10 days is pretty unrealistic, especially if you live in FL. I live in Fl and it is tough getting in and out of the state. You will find yourself staying out longer than most drivers due to this. Our company had a terminal in GA and my wife and I would often drive our car to Atlanta because it was more convenient than trying to get a load in and out of Fl. For example, say you have been out for 6 weeks and you decide to take a few days off. You are in New Mexico. Your company will send you to Nebraska to get a load to go to Georgia to get a load to go to Boston to get you to Chicago which will get you to Alabama which sets you up to bring a load to Miami which will take you to Jacksonville and then end up delivering in Tampa. This is how it used to work for us on many occasions! If the company doesn't have a load that delivers near your home town then they will run you about to set you up to get a load that will. Companies won't just deadhead you home. Now if you are an Owner Operator that's a different story. You just pay whatever your fuel cost and you can deadhead if there is no loads going your way. Not recommended but is an option.

 

Here you go! A driver just posted this as I was trying to explain what getting home can be like! This is from another driver on a different thread. This was his post:

"Not happy anymore I do what I can to help this company anytime they ask me to. But over the 3 years I've asked for maybe 3 or 4 favors of my own while completing dozens of favors asked of me. Well, I need a favor this weekend and seems the company has left me out to dry. I put in for home time Monday for today. 6 days, seems pretty easy to do. Problem is I was in the shop since Wednesday due to APU and recall problems. Got everything fixed by Friday and I advised again I needed to go home. I was roughly 5 hours away in Canton, OH and could have taken any load they needed to Louisville, t-call and go home for a couple of days.

Well weekend dispatch obviously had other plans for me so they sent me to Louisiana for a Sunday drop. Now I'm stuck in Pineville with dispatch telling me there's no freight here. That's just ####### wonderful. I've never seen such opportunistic ######## in my life. I will roll heads if I don't get home by Tuesday morning. This is piss poor planning and most likely disregard for a request. Let's see what Mr. Cushman thinks of that. Eh, who am I kidding. He probably doesn't give a ####."

 

chompi's not BSing. I'm that driver he quoted. I did end up getting home Tuesday at 0630 and was just in time for my interview I was set to attend. The only reason I even got home on time is because I accepted a load heading to NJ and then had my dispatch get approval to take the load home. Also, the shipper loaded me 5 hours earlier than my appointment, otherwise I'd of missed everything. I just got somewhat lucky.

I lived in Ocala before moving to Kentucky. Florida is just a hard state to get home to. Unless freight is directly going into Florida, you'll have a hell of a time getting home. I remember a few occasions where I had to swap loads with 2 or 3 different drivers to finally get home. You just can't do like other states where a load just has to pass through, not terminate in that state to get home.

 

I never have trouble getting into Florida with Star. A huge part of our freightbase is with the Quaker out of Orlando?Kiss. area. We also run down to Miami with Schering-Plough medical supplies and Coca-Cola. We have a terminal in Orlando (its not a great, basically a gravel yard with a mobile command center on it) and a drop yard in Jacksonville.

When you go to work with Star, the fleets are divided either Northeast, Midwest, Southeast or OTR. I'm on the Southeast division, I live mostly in TN, with a place with my girlfriend in Madison, FL and I usually spend my time between Atlanta and Orlando.