Class starting 25 Oct 11

It's quite a bit more than a couple of cups of coffee. If it were done without the inteference of IRS rules concerning independent contractors, a week of intensive classroom work might do it.

- Business principles
- Basic accounting
- Strategies for:
... Tolls
... Routes/planning
... Expenses
... Fuel purchasing
- How to read and understand a settlement statement
- Tax planning
- Hours of service
- Planning home time/vacation
- Equipment maintenance
- Dealing with reefer fuel

All these things bear into it - getting most folks to understand just how IFTA tax works and how that affects where you buy fuel takes most of a morning to get it across. You see, most people coming into the industry figure - truck drivers... how hard can it be? Why any caveman ought to be able to do it, so it should be a snap for me! Look at the numbers... not so many are very successful at the business end, because its a lot more than just mashing the throttle down and heading down the road. Inexperienced drivers really struggle with all of this, on top of having to deal with just getting a load backed into a dock - then parking without getting into a truckstop accident.

 

Let me see if I have this down.

You pump fuel in BFE, OK. There's the pump price, there's Prime's discount price. Your receipt shows pump price. Your settlement reflects Prime's discount price. Included in that is all the assorted taxes. Part of which is IFTA tax. Prime somewhere has someone figuring out how much you paid into your IFTA "fund" from said fuel. Once every quarter someone at Prime figures out how many miles you've run in each state, sends off the appropriate amount of money, and if that amount is less than what you paid in IFTA, then you get a refund.

 

Ah... not quite. You need to make sure that its your truck they're using for the mileage calculation... not the fleet average, especially if you do a good job at fuel economy. Prime does that... many don't.

Then there is buying the fuel... did a post on this somewhere else if you were paying attention.

You want the base price, because you're going to pay the amount of tax they figure whether you pay enough or not into the kitty.

Pump price - discounts - state tax = base price.

Use base price for price comparison across the length of your trip, only in-route locations. Get the current discounted fuel price from the fuel price page under "Drivers On-line." Macro 27 is fine in a pinch, but it makes assumptions about how you drive - and it assumes you're too stupid to figure out when you're going to run out of fuel. The buy quantities are hedged to prevent this rather than just simply purchasing as much of the cheapest fuel that you can.

When this is taught during lease orientation or ACE-II, you'd be surprised how many don't get the concept that everything going into the fuel kitty may not necessarily be lost in the gubbermints pocket. Then there's others who still assume you HAVE to buy fuel in every state you run in (hasn't been that way for years.) And then there's the folks that are just plain brand-loyal... "Every Flippin' J has the lowest price, and you can't tell me otherwise!"

...actually that assumption about being too stupid to figure out when you're going to run out of fuel isn't that far off the mark in far too many cases.

 

got to remember the atlas gps doesnt know all...trust me if i had followed toms directions all the time i would of been screwed

 

I made that mistake while going through TNT. GPS got me way way off track in Oklahoma. Also I ended up driving through 3 toll booths because of it. Needles to say, I still use my Rand Mcnally, but I compare it to my Mac 27,15 and my atlas everytime I stop the truck. My GPS likes to play tricks on me, and sometimes when I take a break and get out if the truck she changes the routing on me while I'm not looking.

 

The GPS is only a tool - and it's only as good as the programming that went into it. Doesn't much matter to the geek that put the bits in whether it leads you down a sharp turn into a barber shop. The roads and laws change daily - and if you're trusting the little box to be right, then you deserve what's coming at ya.

You've got to use all the tools, and that means knowing the route in the first place. You need to use the RMCA, online resources (Google Earth, MapQuest, etc) and the instructions out of the QualComm. Macro 15 and macro 19 have to be your primary guide. If you get into a bind (especially with some damaged equipment) because of faulty programming or routing in a GPS, you're going to be on the hook for it. That doesn't mean the QC instructions are always right - and that's where the other tools come in.

I can't tell you how many times truck-qualified GPS's have tried to take me down little country lanes or residential streets that are off limits to semi's. You have to be the final judge of where you're going, and if its right.

 

My GPS tried to take me down a short cut through Modesto... Down every "NO TRUCKS" road he could find... I just followed the truck routes and made it just fine. Always gotta be willing to tell the GPS to shove it.