knight transportation

AFAIK, depends on the terminal.

 

Official company policy has always been Trucks get parked at the terminal if you live within, I believe but may be wrong, 25miles of the terminal. If you lived further away you could take your truck home. As with most things at Knight there was a lot of variance on this based on what terminal you where out of. I lived about 15miles from the Tulare(pronounced Tu-larry) terminal and took my truck home all the time.

 

Ok, hold on a minute.
I have to jump in here for a quick reply.

I have been driving for knight for almost a year now, this is the third time i have come back to them.
And i disagree with alot being said about them.

First of all bad trucks? are you kidding! knight has some of the best company trucks on the road.

As far as getting home, yes when i first started with them i had problems there to but after i fired my travel agent (yes you can do this anytime you want) and got on my current board i have zero problems getting home.

iam out 14-16, home 3, i never turn down a load, and in fact have a constant battle with my 70 hr rule.

miles are never an issue.


The whole key to knight is your dispacher, sit down and talk to him before you ever go out, tell him what you want and come to an understanding.

then do the job you were hired to do and you will never hear a thing out of them.


I job hopped alot! england, swift, rohel,werner, trans am, and on.. but i keep ending back up with knight, not looking anymore.

 

I've been with Knight for almost a year and this is what I've experienced:
1. Poor load planning. They usually give the drivers WAY too much time to get a load delivered. I am now having to sit on a load for two days before my appointment. Yes, I asked for a relay, but the DM couldn't find another driver to take it.
2. Toll reimbursement is a JOKE! I have repeatedly called payroll to have my money paid back (which at this time is SEVERAL hundred dollars). I'm still waiting.
3. I wanted to be home for a holiday, but I missed it by a couple of days. Unfortunately, the town doesn't stop and wait for me to get home for the yearly parade and other festivities. Then, I was asked by the DM "since you are going to miss the Holiday, do you want to just stay out and run?" Seriously? I was surprised at myself at the number of expletives that I was able to string together before he hung up on me.
4. WAY too many short, piddly little trips. Not enough miles, not enough pay.
5. They do ONLY enough maintenance on my truck to keep it legal. The truck I drive has been in the shop more than 10 times in the past year.

Needless to say, I am always looking for a new company to drive for, but for now, I'm just happy to have some measure of income.

 

Man you hear these stories about Knight, but once again the knight detractors fail to tell people that each terminal is left to run their own fleet. So if you live in Seattle where many of the drivers are making a grand and up a week and get home every 5-14 days depending on what they are doing you are glad that you do not work out of Hutchinson. Always been told by Knight drivers that you have to stay in your home terminals frt area and not to turn down loads without a good reason.

What the other poster said is true. Since Knight runs single source dping, you have to get along with your dper or you probably won't do well.

 

This was one of my two biggest reasons for leaving them.

Reimbursement and payroll problems being the other reason. I never messed with toll roads if it was possible to drive around them. I wasn't paying for the fuel.

They seem to forget we are human. I remember being out 42 days once and finally got home on a monday. They called me Tuesday and said we have you a load ready anytime after midnight in Lebec. I told them where to go, how to get there and them if they would like help along the way. After that I told them that industry standard is one day off for 7 days out so don't call me again till Sunday. They said we can give you till Friday then we have to have you clean out your truck. Called them on Thursday and told them thanks but no thanks, I'm going to Pride.

Yep, they make more money and drivers make less on these trips. Ain't capitolism fun boys and girls?

That largley depends on the shop you take it to.

Yep, Knight is good enough to be a stopping off place when you need a job or need some steady work history. What it's not is a long term career solution.

 

Once I was out at the knight intermodal whse in long beach ca and it was the mlk holiday and Appearantly Kevin knight had come to long beach with other mgt and had a BBQ with all the drivers & o/o's...

What he didn't bother to say was he was cutting their pay by 50%...
well with myself & several van drivers parked on street, we watched as Monday evening came & the port of long beach was beginning to reopen...the o/o's took a stand and with the back stabbing pay cuts that they recieved showed up to work and met with each other & made the decision that no containers would be moved until hey had their $$ in their hands and reinstated pay..

They had 100 loads of cotton that had to go to the ships that night and 50 Ikea loads that needed del but they boycotted..nothing was coming in or going out..

They actually forced some company intermodal truck to back out of driveway & take the load to the Fontana yard...this had Phoenix mgt scrambling to save their behinds.

 

I love it !!!!

 

Awesome, Ikea is there biggest customer and the cotton and hay are for one of Kevin's brothers that brokers that stuff oversea's. Couldn't of hit them where it counts any more then that.

 

WOW!!! Sweet! lol